eclipse 2009 - 6m 42s

many people opt to jump on a cruise ship to view total solar eclipses since the mobile boats can, ideally, move quickly over the water to find clear patches of sky! unfortunately, reports i received from friends on boats last week were not all positive.

yesterday, APOD featured the panoramic image below, captured by babak tafreshi, as he cruised along on the deck of a boat at the point of maximum eclipse!


notice how the horizon, in every direction, resembles a sunset, as photons from the sun still scatter thru the atmosphere a hundred miles away!

there are some other artistic eclipse photos at spaceweather.com. i particularly like this one by alan dyer: