An annular
solar eclipse
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of the Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs during an eclipse season, approximately every six month ...
occurred on July 14, 1749. 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. An annular 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 smaller than the Sun's, blocking most of the Sun's light and causing the Sun to look like an
annulus
Annulus (or anulus) or annular indicates a ring- or donut-shaped area or structure. It may refer to:
Human anatomy
* ''Anulus fibrosus disci intervertebralis'', spinal structure
* Annulus of Zinn, a.k.a. annular tendon or ''anulus tendineus com ...
(ring). An annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region of the Earth thousands of kilometres wide.
Description
The eclipse was visible in much of South America except for Guyaranquil, New Granada (now in Ecuador) and around it and the southern tip, Florida (then also as Spanish Florida) and the Caribbean, the Atlantic, much of Africa except for the Ottoman lands of a part of Tunis including Philippeville (now Bizerte) and Carthage, Cyrenaica, Egypt and East Nubia as well as the Somali Peninsula and much of Spain and Portugal except for the Pyrenees. It was also visible in a small part of the Indian Ocean and hundreds of miles (or kilometers) offshore from Antarctica.
It was part of
solar saros 132
Saros cycle series 132 for solar eclipse
A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of the Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs during an ...
.
The umbral portion which was as far as 141 km (88 km) included the northern Amazon, Roraima, British Guiana (now Guyana), Surinam (then also Dutch Guyana) and French Guiana in South America, in Africa it was 85–95 miles (135–150 km) south of the island of Santiago in (Portuguese) Cape Verde, on the mainland, it included the Bijagós Archipelago, Conakry, present-day Ivory Coast and Ghana, Angola, Great Zimbabwe (now Zimbabwe) and Mozambique, off the mainland, it included the southernmost tip of Madagascar. The greatest occurred just over a mile (2 km) west of
Koulikoro
Koulikoro ( Bambara: ߞߎߟߌߞߏߙߏ tr. Kulikoro) is a town and urban commune in Mali. The capital of the Koulikoro Region, Koulikoro is located on banks of the Niger River, downstream from Mali's capital Bamako.
Koulikoro is the terminus of ...
in Tonkpi in present-day Ivory Coast at 7.8 N, 7.2 W at 12:19 UTC and lasted for over 4 minutes.
The eclipse showed up to 50% obscuration in Santo Domingo (now in the Dominican Republic), Rio de Oro, the Tuareg lands, the fringes of Mali, Songhai, Bornu, Wadai (now part of Chad), Kivu, Uganda, the Kilimanjaro and the Serengeti regions (now part of Tanzania) and on the other side the edges of the Amazon, Tocantins and Recife in Brazil and the southernmost area of Africa.
The eclipse started in South America with a bit of the Pacific Ocean around it and ended at sunset east of the Mascarene Islands (compromising Réunion and Mauritius).
The subsolar marking was in Mali.
In parts of the world, the eclipse was not seen in some areas in areas that had monsoon rains mainly within the rim areas.
See also
*
List of solar eclipses in the 18th century
This is a list of solar eclipses in the 18th century. During the period 1701 to 1800 there were 251 solar eclipses of which 92 were partial, 78 were annular, 62 were total, and 19 were hybrids. The greatest number of eclipses in one year was fou ...
References
External links
Google interactive mapsSolar eclipse data
{{Solar eclipses
1749 7 14
1749 in science
1749 07 14
July events