Chuck Hards wrote:
Has anyone determined if this weekend's eclipse will be visible from SPOC? Totality is very brief for this eclipse, and from Utah it rises already entering the umbra (from a theoretically flat horizon).
Im wondering if it will be essentially over before cresting the mountain ridge as seen from Stansbury.
Can someone with a planetarium program check this out?
I went over to SPOC a few weeks ago and took a few measurements. Here's what I found. Trees will block the Ealing's and Brandt's view of the eclipse until well after totality has ended so they will be used for observing Enke, Venus and Mars. However, by walking just a few steps north of the building the trees are no longer a problem and I saw Gamma Geminorum, also known as Alhena, rise over the horizon at 12:57 a.m. At that time it was at azimuth 075 degrees and altitude 7.75 degrees. On eclipse night the Moon will reach totality when it is at 076 azimuth and 8 degrees altitude. Since Gamma rose over a slope running from upper left to lower right, the Moon rising to the right by 1 degree might be visible a minute or two before going total but certainly not early enough to have any significant portion of the partial phase being visible from SPOC. Still, a fully eclipsed Moon sitting on the snow covered mountains could make for some great pictures. As for the partial phase leading up to totality one should remember that at the time the Moon reaches totality (18:06) the Sun will be barely 10 degrees below the opposite horizon so the sky will not be all that dark, especially early in the partial phase. So going somewhere higher (and colder) to see the partial phase might not be worth the trip. Of course, judging from the weather reports, we're probably going to get clouded out anyway. Regardless of what happens with this eclipse, I'm looking forward to next October's eclipse which will be much better placed for Utahns. Patrick