Embedded Files
On Wednesday, August 11th. 1999, shortly after 10:10 GMT (11:10 BST) a total solar eclipse occurred over parts of Cornwall and South Devon. This page gives details of the eclipse in and around Torbay (see the virtual tour!).
At the time Dave Norman was "The Eclipse Coordinator".
An internet webcast was successfully conducted live from the observatory at the Torquay Boys' Grammar School. Astronomers from around the UK and the rest of the world stayed on the school's playing field near to the observatory, during the eclipse week.
On the morning of the eclipse TAS members were present at suitable viewpoints around the bay, equipped with telescope projection facilities and able to give advice on safety and viewing techniques.
Within Torbay the total eclipse period commenced at 10:14UT (11:14BST), lasting for over one minute. The Moon's 65 mile wide totality shadow moved (at about 1900 miles per hour) from West to East, making the Torbay area the last part of mainland Britain to experience totality until just before sunset on the 23rd. September in the year 2090!
The table below shows the eclipse timing at various locations in and around Torbay. First Contact is the moment when the Moon first begins to obscure the Sun. Second Contact is the start of the total eclipse period, ending at Third Contact. Fourth Contact marks the moment when the Sun is no longer obscured.
Note: all times are UT. Add 1 hour for British Summer Time.
Here's how the sky looked (schematically, at least!). The eclipsed sun was roughly 47 degrees above the horizon at a bearing of 133 degrees from true North. Venus, at around magnitude -4, was a brilliant object below and to the left of the sun/moon. Mercury (magnitude 0.7) was visible slightly above and to the right of the sun/moon. Low above the Western horizon Jupiter (magnitude -2.1) was another bright object, with Saturn (magnitude 0.1) above and to the left. The 'winter' constellation of Orion was prominent slightly West of South.
A dramatic photo of the totality through fast moving broken cloud by Gary Gordon from a cliff at St. Martin Plage in France - about 10Km East of Dieppe.
Gary used a 1/60th second exposure at prime focus of an 84mm aperture, 1000mm f/l telescope working at F12 onto Kodak Gold print 200 A.S.A print film.
Note the detached prominence just off the right hand limb.
Two images of totality as seen from Torquay by Chris Palin (TAS).
Chris and family were fortunate enough to see some coronal effects and prominences during totality.
A sequence of images captured and compiled by Dave Norman during the live web-cast from the TBGS observatory!
Over 208,000 of these images were actually downloaded by over 10,000 different locations in at least 70 countries on eclipse day (mostly between 10:00 and 12:00 BST)
This set of images were all taken by Steve Pope and are reproduced here by kind permission of the "Herald Express".Â
Google Sites
Report abuse