|
 |
 advertisement
| |
|
|
|
|
|
Live Webcast, Photos of Sunday's Solar Eclipse
By SPACE.com Staff
posted: 07:00 am ET
21 November 2003
|
do we want to do something wiith this Editor's Note: The eclipse is over, and a photo is here. A total solar eclipse visible only from Antarctica Sunday will be webcast live by a nonprofit Japanese organization called Live! Universe. Pictures of the eclipse will be available on SPACE.com by Monday morning, assuming all goes well with a separate airborne expedition of astronomers and eclipse fanatics. A partial eclipse will be visible from Australia and New Zealand. But the total eclipse will be seen in person -- weather permitting -- by only a handful of venturesome explorers, self-avowed eclipse fanatics. Meanwhile, armchair astronomers around the world can watch the webcast, if all goes well. It is the first attempted observation of a total solar eclipse from the Antarctic since human beings set up a base there, the organization said in a statement released this week. It is also the first attempt to webcast a total solar eclipse from the Antarctic. The expedition leader, Yuichi Ichikawa, left Japan in early November by air, then took a ship from South Africa to the Sackleton Ice Shelf on the south polar continent. Three video cameras will be directed at the eclipse. Images will be sent to Tokyo from a personal computer via either the INMARSAT or Iridium satellite. The webcast begins at 4 p.m. ET (2100 UT) on Sunday, Nov. 23. In Japan, that corresponds to 6 a.m. local time on Nov. 24. The web site, at http://www.live-eclipse.org/, includes reports from the observation party, a travel journal, and information about the eclipse. On eclipse day, the site will also list the temperature, illuminance and barometric pressure information from the scene. A visual simulation of the Moon's shadow, as seen from above the Antarctic, will allow site visitors to see how big and how fast the lunar shadow moves across Earth. Solar eclipses are caused with the Moon is directly between Earth and the Sun. A second observation party led by Live! Universe will take images of the total solar eclipse from an airplane, and upload the images to the web site a few hours later. Another airborne astrophotographer working for Sky & Telescope magazine will attempt to image the eclipse. Those pictures, if the venture is successful, will be available on SPACE.com, from the home page late Sunday night (ET) or early Monday morning.
|
|
|
|
|
