Solar eclipse of September 22, 1968

Solar eclipse of September 22, 1968
Solar eclipse of September 22, 1968
	Map
Type of eclipse
Nature	Total
Gamma	0.9451
Magnitude	1.0099
Maximum eclipse
Duration	40 s (0 min 40 s)
Coordinates	56°12′N 64°00′E / 56.2°N 64°E
Max. width of band	104 km (65 mi)
Times (UTC)
Greatest eclipse	11:18:46
References
Saros	124 (52 of 73)
Catalog # (SE5000)	9439

A total solar eclipse occurred on September 22, 1968. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby totally or partly obscuring the image of the Sun for a viewer on Earth. A total solar eclipse occurs when the Moon's apparent diameter is larger than the Sun's, blocking all direct sunlight, turning day into darkness. Totality occurs in a narrow path across Earth's surface, with the partial solar eclipse visible over a surrounding region thousands of kilometres wide. Totality was visible from the Soviet Union (today's Russia and Kazakhstan) and Xinjiang in Northwestern China.

Related eclipses

Solar eclipses of 1968–1971

This eclipse is a member of a semester series. An eclipse in a semester series of solar eclipses repeats approximately every 177 days and 4 hours (a semester) at alternating nodes of the Moon's orbit.^[1]

Solar eclipse series sets from 1968 to 1971
Ascending node			Descending node
Saros	Map	Gamma	Saros	Map	Gamma
119	1968 March 28 Partial	−1.03704	124	1968 September 22 Total	0.94507
129	1969 March 18 Annular	−0.27037	134	1969 September 11 Annular	0.22014
139	1970 March 7 Total	0.44728	144	1970 August 31 Annular	−0.53640
149	1971 February 25 Partial	1.11876	154	1971 August 20 Partial	−1.26591
A partial solar eclipse of July 22, 1971 occurs in the next lunar year set.

Saros 124

Solar saros 124, repeating every about 18 years and 11 days, contains 73 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on March 6, 1049. It contains total eclipses from June 12, 1211, to September 22, 1968, and a hybrid solar eclipse on October 3, 1986. The series ends at member 73 as a partial eclipse on May 11, 2347. The longest total eclipse occurred on May 3, 1734, at 5 minutes and 46 seconds.^[2]

Series members 43–59 occur between 1801 and 2100:
43	44	45
June 16, 1806	June 26, 1824	July 8, 1842
46	47	48
July 18, 1860	July 29, 1878	August 9, 1896
49	50	51
August 21, 1914	August 31, 1932	September 12, 1950
52	53	54
September 22, 1968	October 3, 1986	October 14, 2004
55	56	57
October 25, 2022	November 4, 2040	November 16, 2058
58	59
November 26, 2076	December 7, 2094

Tritos series

This eclipse is a part of a tritos cycle, repeating at alternating nodes every 135 synodic months (≈ 3986.63 days, or 11 years minus 1 month). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee), but groupings of 3 tritos cycles (≈ 33 years minus 3 months) come close (≈ 434.044 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.

Series members between 1901 and 2100
March 29, 1903 (Saros 118)	February 25, 1914 (Saros 119)	January 24, 1925 (Saros 120)
December 25, 1935 (Saros 121)	November 23, 1946 (Saros 122)	October 23, 1957 (Saros 123)
September 22, 1968 (Saros 124)	August 22, 1979 (Saros 125)	July 22, 1990 (Saros 126)
June 21, 2001 (Saros 127)	May 20, 2012 (Saros 128)	April 20, 2023 (Saros 129)
March 20, 2034 (Saros 130)	February 16, 2045 (Saros 131)	January 16, 2056 (Saros 132)
December 17, 2066 (Saros 133)	November 15, 2077 (Saros 134)	October 14, 2088 (Saros 135)
September 14, 2099 (Saros 136)