A total solar eclipse occurred on 19 August 1887. A solar eclipse occurs when the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

passes between

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

and the

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

, 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 The angular diameter, angular size, apparent diameter, or apparent size is an angular distance describing how large a sphere or circle appears from a given point of view. In the vision sciences, it is called the visual angle, and in optics, it is ...

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. It was visible across

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, and Japan.

Observations

The Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev ascended in a balloon near

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...

to observe this eclipse. The weather in

Tver Governorate Tver Governorate (russian: Тверская губерния, ''Tverskaya guberniya'') was an administrative division (a '' guberniya'') of the Russian Empire and Russian SFSR, which existed from 1796 until 1929. Its seat was in Tver. The governo ...

was cloudy and it was rain at morning, so Mendeleev forced to fly alone. He made some notes at 6:55, 20 minutes after the start, and made some observations of the

solar corona A corona ( coronas or coronae) is the outermost layer of a star's atmosphere. It consists of plasma. The Sun's corona lies above the chromosphere and extends millions of kilometres into outer space. It is most easily seen during a total solar ...

. For this flight, the scientist was awarded the medal of the Academy of Aerostatic Meteorology. Russian writer Anton Chekhov published the short story "From the Diary of a Hot-Tempered Man" six weeks before the eclipse passed through Russia. The story includes a major section about the frustrations of a man who is trying to make a great variety of observations during the short interval of totality. In the story the eclipse date is given as 7 August 1887, but this is not an error. This is the correct date on the Julian Calendar, then in force in Russia, which did not convert to the Gregorian calendar until after the establishment of the USSR.

Related eclipses

Solar 143

Notes

References

NASA graphic

Googlemap

NASA Besselian elements

"Preliminary Report of Prof. David P. Todd, Astronomer in Charge of the Expedition." Published by the Observatory Amherst, Mass., 1888 *
The total solar eclipse of August 19, 1887

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society ''Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society'' (MNRAS) is a peer-reviewed scientific journal covering research in astronomy and astrophysics. It has been in continuous existence since 1827 and publishes letters and papers reporting orig ...

, Vol. 48, p. 202
Sketchs of Solar Corona August 19, 1887

Solar eclipse of August 19, 1887 in Russia
{{Commons category, Solar eclipse of 1887 August 19 1887 08 19 1887 in science 1887 08 19 August 1887 events