Solar eclipse of May 20, 2012

Solar eclipse of May 20, 2012
Solar eclipse of May 20, 2012
	Composite image taken from Red Bluff, California
	Map
Type of eclipse
Nature	Annular
Gamma	0.4828
Magnitude	0.9439
Maximum eclipse
Duration	346 s (5 min 46 s)
Coordinates	49°06′N 176°18′E / 49.1°N 176.3°E
Max. width of band	237 km (147 mi)
Times (UTC)
(P1) Partial begin	20:56:07
(U1) Total begin	22:06:17
Greatest eclipse	23:53:54
(U4) Total end	1:39:11
(P4) Partial end	2:49:21
References
Saros	128 (58 of 73)
Catalog # (SE5000)	9535

An annular solar eclipse took place on May 20, 2012 (May 21, 2012 in local time in the Eastern Hemisphere), with a magnitude of 0.9439. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun annular solar eclipse occurs when the Moon's apparent diameter is smaller than the Sun's, blocking most of the Sun's light and causing the Sun to look like an annulus (ring). An annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region of the Earth thousands of kilometres wide.

Visibility

North America

It was the first annular eclipse in the continental U.S. since the solar eclipse of May 10, 1994 which was also the previous eclipse of this series Solar Saros 128.

Animation as viewed from Albuquerque, New Mexico, showing sunset before the eclipse ends

Animation of eclipse path from space

Hong Kong

It was predicted that the antumbra would pass over Hong Kong but due to weather it was not observable.

Photo Gallery

Asia

Solar eclipse of May 21, 2012 in Keelung, Taiwan
Tokushima, Tokushima, Japan
Aichi Prefecture, Japan
Kōfu, Japan
Aoba-ku, Yokohama, Japan
23 wards of Tokyo, Japan
Tokyo, Japan
Video from Tokyo, Japan
Kashima, Ibaraki, Japan

USA

Red Bluff, California
Crescent shadows on an outdoor wall in San Francisco, California.
Crescent shaped shadows from tree on a wall in San Francisco, California
Crescent images from solar eclipse, May 2012 in San Francisco, California
Photo taken from San Francisco, California
Composite image from Huntington Beach, California
From Palm Springs, California, wide angle
From Los Osos, California
Photo taken from San Juan Capistrano, California at 1:20 UTC
$80mm refractor, 1:36 UTC, Nevada City, California$

80mm refractor, 1:36 UTC, Nevada City, California
Near Phoenix, Arizona

Near Phoenix, Arizona
Eclipse as seen from Flagstaff, Arizona
Amateur scientists observing eclipse in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Center line, south shore of Pyramid Lake (Nevada) in Nevada.
2012-05-20 Eclipse as seen from Wolfforth, Texas.
Partial Solar Eclipse in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Partial Solar Eclipse in Salt Lake City, Utah.
From Pleasant Grove, Utah
East of Ogden, Iowa at 1:25 UTC
Minneapolis, Minnesota at 1:27:53 UTC
Lenexa, Kansas in Shawnee Mission Park
$Projection method using 60mm refractor from Medford, Oregon.$

Projection method using 60mm refractor from Medford, Oregon.

Related eclipses

Solar eclipses 2011–2014

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]

The partial solar eclipses on January 4, 2011 and July 1, 2011 occur in the previous lunar year eclipse set.

Solar eclipse series sets from 2011 to 2014
Descending node			Ascending node
Saros	Map	Gamma	Saros	Map	Gamma
118 Partial in Tromsø, Norway	June 1, 2011 Partial	1.21300	123 Hinode XRT footage	November 25, 2011 Partial	−1.05359
128 Annularity in Red Bluff, CA, USA	May 20, 2012 Annular	0.48279	133 Totality in Mount Carbine, Queensland, Australia	November 13, 2012 Total	−0.37189
138 Annularity in Churchills Head, Australia	May 10, 2013 Annular	−0.26937	143 Partial in Libreville, Gabon	November 3, 2013 Hybrid	0.32715
148 Partial in Adelaide, Australia	April 29, 2014 Annular (non-central)	−0.99996	153 Partial in Minneapolis, MN, USA	October 23, 2014 Partial	1.09078

Saros 128

This eclipse is a part of Saros series 128, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, and containing 73 events. The series started with a partial solar eclipse on August 29, 984 AD. It contains total eclipses from May 16, 1417 through June 18, 1471; hybrid eclipses from June 28, 1489 through July 31, 1543; and annular eclipses from August 11, 1561 through July 25, 2120. The series ends at member 73 as a partial eclipse on November 1, 2282. Its eclipses are tabulated in three columns; every third eclipse in the same column is one exeligmos apart, so they all cast shadows over approximately the same parts of the Earth.

The longest duration of totality was produced by member 27 at 1 minutes, 45 seconds on June 7, 1453, and the longest duration of annularity was produced by member 48 at 8 minutes, 35 seconds on February 1, 1832. All eclipses in this series occur at the Moon’s descending node of orbit.^[2]

Series members 47–68 occur between 1801 and 2200:
47	48	49
January 21, 1814	February 1, 1832	February 12, 1850
50	51	52
February 23, 1868	March 5, 1886	March 17, 1904
53	54	55
March 28, 1922	April 7, 1940	April 19, 1958
56	57	58
April 29, 1976	May 10, 1994	May 20, 2012
59	60	61
June 1, 2030	June 11, 2048	June 22, 2066
62	63	64
July 3, 2084	July 15, 2102	July 25, 2120
65	66	67
August 5, 2138	August 16, 2156	August 27, 2174
68
September 6, 2192

Metonic series

The metonic series repeats eclipses every 19 years (6939.69 days), lasting about 5 cycles. Eclipses occur in nearly the same calendar date. In addition, the octon subseries repeats 1/5 of that or every 3.8 years (1387.94 days). All eclipses in this table occur at the Moon's descending node.

21 eclipse events between May 21, 1993 and May 20, 2069
May 20–21	March 9	December 25–26	October 13–14	August 1–2
118	120	122	124	126
May 21, 1993	March 9, 1997	December 25, 2000	October 14, 2004	August 1, 2008
128	130	132	134	136
May 20, 2012	March 9, 2016	December 26, 2019	October 14, 2023	August 2, 2027
138	140	142	144	146
May 21, 2031	March 9, 2035	December 26, 2038	October 14, 2042	August 2, 2046
148	150	152	154	156
May 20, 2050	March 9, 2054	December 26, 2057	October 13, 2061	August 2, 2065
158
May 20, 2069