Loyd & Patty Overcash
Barbara Wilson
Richard Nugent
Steve Goldgerg
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From Loyd and Patty Overcash
We started planning our Curacao Eclipse Trip over 12 months ago. It seemed like it would never come. On the morning of the eclipse, our spirits were crushed as we departed the hotel in route to the viewing sight - IN THE RAIN!!!! Silence filled the bus for the one hour ride to the viewing sight. As we approached our destination, talk began to fill the air about - maybe - we would be able to see some of the eclipse through the clouds. As the bus parked and we disembarked, the dark rain clouds started to lighten. As we planted the Texas flag at our sight, the clouds vanished. Everyone's spirits lifted and the excitement could be felt by all as cameras and telescopes were prepared. A cry came out, "Two minutes until first contact". My pace quickened to be sure that I was ready for the first photo. Patty already had the video camera running. THERE IT IS! - someone shouted - FIRST CONTACT. Over the next hour last minute preparations were being made by all. Again a cry came out - TWO MINUTES UNTIL TOTALITY. I felt my heart quicken, my hands trembled - I was about to witness my first total solar eclipse. As the last sliver of sunlight faded, the shadow bands danced across the ground. The cheers and crys began to be heard. Then there it was - TOTALITY. The corona was huge and a bright red prominence was visible on the north limb. Venus, Jupiter and Mercury were all visible. The moon was jet black against a white corona in a dark sky. I was taking photos and Patty was shooting video. Then, from no where the sunlight shot out from behind the moon. It was over. This was the quickest 3 1/2 minutes I have ever experienced. The excitement ran rampid for the next 30 minutes as we all told our impressions of what we had seen. Several TV stations gathered at our site and began to interview people, this revived the excitement again. As we stowed our equipment on the bus, Patty & I began making our plans for the next TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE. Hope to see you there. It will be something that will last in your memory forever. There is no way to describe what we saw in Curacao. The photos and video images will be a constant reminder of the beauty of this event.
Loyd and Patty Overcash
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Curacao Eclipse
The below account is compiled from my audio tape of the eclipse.
We were on the beach at Playa Kalki at Kadushi Cliffs (a wonderful resort), near the northern most part of the island of Curacao. Actually the beach was below us, as we were on a ledge of stable ground with a rock wall behind us to block the winds which blow constantly here in the Caribbean Sea. The trade winds were to our back and the winds were evident when I walked up the stone staircase to the parking lot, just east of us. The easterly tradewinds blocked by the wall, did not give us any respite from the heat, so we were very warm all morning, We arrived around 8:00 AM in order to secure a good spot on this tiny beach. About 10:00 AM some very light sprinkle drops fell for a few minutes, and the clouds obscured the sun on and off for about an hour, then the sky cleared and stayed perfectly clear. Later we heard that the rain fell hard enough to our southeast to cause the cars and buses to turn on windshield wipers.
We had an unobstructed view of the south, west and northwest over the sea, with 7 large boats and one large cruise ship the Statendam to our northwest.
Crescent suns by the thousands were cast onto the ground under the tropical trees at one hour into the eclipse. The air temperature started to drop and give us a breather from the strong tropical heat, and may have dropped at least 5 degrees about 10 to 15 minutes before totality. The birds stopped singing as the sun became a fierce bright sliver of light in the clear blue sky 61 degrees above our heads.
I dark adapt at 5 minutes prior to totality’s onset in order to see the earliest hint of the moon’s shadow in the distance.
The shadow of the moon is now visible as a long gray horizontal line about 1/2 degree in size on the southwestern horizon as the sun is becoming the tiniest sliver of light. It is a very faint line barely perceptible at first, but at every second’s passing the moon’s shadow grows larger and darker. The speed of the shadow is awesome as it traverses the ocean in front of us speeding toward our little beach. The shadow is now taking on the color of a grayish blue thunderstorm seen in summertime except that its edges are feathery instead of hard and distinct, as it rushes toward us. (The elapsed time from the first sight of the shadow on the ocean until the diamond ring became visible lasted 2 minutes and 27 seconds)
Venus is visible one minute before totality, as the shadow looms higher and darker. The first Bailey's bead is visible at 1 minute 54 seconds after seeing the first hint of the shadow on the horizon. The second bead at the opposite end of the crescent is visible 6 seconds later. The diamond ring is visible 26 seconds after the second bead, the diamond ring is lasting much longer than I have seen in two previous total eclipses, probably due to its location on a smooth portion of the moon. The diamond rings lasts an incredible 16 seconds. The diamond ring is brilliant with the inner corona very bright. As the light of the long diamond ring is extinguished, the full glory of the outer corona bursts into view instantaneously with Mercury and Jupiter as two jewels framing the view, a little dog on the beach starts barking, and barks throughout totality. . The sky is absolutely clear so the feathering of the polar brushes and strong equatorial streamers seem engraved. A bright large pink prominence is visible to the naked eye at the beginning of totality. No artist’s brush could paint the streamers at the sun’s poles as fine as the eye sees them.
The corona with Mercury to the upper left and Jupiter to the lower right is absolutely stunning. The polar brushes are beautiful and the equatorial streamers extend about a degree and a half, just now someone is shooting off fireworks near midtotality to our south. The Coronal streamer at the bottom of the Sun is wide and bulging as it leaves the blackness of the moon then it tapers very narrowly and feathers away into space. The upper coronal streamers are dual, overlapping each other, as they stream away from the sun. But what captures my eye the most are the fine polar strokes of light, so distinct and sharp.
Looking through my 11X 80 binoculars three extremely bright prominences appear at 2 minutes and 59 seconds into totality as reddish-pink rubies at the lower limb of the black moon. The black moon is framed by this pearlescent white gossamer light with three rubies outlining its extreme edges. The sky is now lightening to the southwest. As I look around the horizon, the sky is yellowish to the west, and dark blue to the east. The polar brush strokes are delicate pearly fine lines, the sky is now very light yellowish to the west and dark to east. The second diamond ring is on…. Its Over.
3 minutes and 26 seconds have elapsed according to my audio tape.
Shadow bands at third contact are strong and distinct, the first time I have seen them in 3 eclipses. Venus is still visible about 20 degrees above the horizon about 10 minutes after totality.
At 9 minutes and 50 seconds after totality, the birds started singing again very loudly.Barbara Wilson
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Richard Nugent's Bailey's Bead story
The International Occultation Timing Association (IOTA) sent two expeditions of observers for the Feb 26 eclipse in the continuing study to monitor possible solar radius variations. The two teams were stationed at each of the northern and southern umbral eclipse limits. By accurately determining the width of the umbral shadow on the ground, this information can be used to determine with good precision the diameter of the Sun. The basic idea is to determine if an observer at or near the eclipse limit has totality or not. If the observer has totality, then he is within the umbra. If the observer does not have totality, then he is outside the umbra. With several observers stationed near the limits of the north and south eclipse limits, the width of the shadow can be determined. Umbral limits are derived using Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) receivers.
The lunar topography is non-smooth (i.e., mountains, craters, valleys, etc.). As the moon "grazes" by the Sun during the eclipse, the rugged lunar limb topography allows beads of sunlight to shine through. This effect is called "Baily's Beads" named in honor of Francis Baily who first noted the phenomena in 1836. The lunar limb profile is also known accurately from grazing occultations of stars. So in advance of the eclipse we have a fairly good idea which mountains and valleys will cause the beads to appear. While Baily's Beads are briefly seen for a few seconds at the central path of the eclipse, their effect is maximized near the eclipse limits to 1-2 minutes.
At the northern eclipse limit on the island of Los Monjes off the coast of Venezuela were Drs. David Dunham (IOTA's President), Hans Bode (IOTA-Europe) and Patricia Rosenzweig (Universidad de Los Andes, Venezuela). At the southern limit on Curacao were Drs. Wayne Warren (NASA -GSFC), Jay Miller, Isao Sato (National Astronomical Observatory - Japan), Chuck Herold (Austin) and Richard Nugent (IOTA - Houston).
The images shown here were "grabbed" off my video taken from our site 1 kilometer inside the southern limit near the southeastern part of the Curacao island. They represent a 20 second interval showing a 60 degree arc of the Sun's limb. Notice how the Beads begin to grow and merge together as the moon "grazes" by the sun's disk.
I used a low light CCD black & white video camera on my Meade 4" SCT with a Thousand Oaks filter. A short wave radio was tuned to WWV to receive time signals which are critical for timing the individual Baily's Beads appearance and disappearance. About 30 minutes before totality, several Security Guards tried to get us to move from our site to another location 200 yards away. We had explained to them that we had to be within 20 meters of our current location in order to perform our scientific research. Chuck Herold and I showed them on our GPS receivers how such a move would ruin our efforts. Time was running out too. The Guards were concerned about our safety as there might be some large trucks driving by. They finally agreed to let us stay at our own risk. We thanked them and proceeded with our observations.
Our off the road site was very dusty and very breezy. I had brought a tarp and PVC pipe to construct a wind shield. It held up. The first Baily's Beads appeared about 90 seconds before mid eclipse on my camcorder screen. As mid eclipse approached, I looked up away from the video up at the Sun. The wide, shimmering corona appeared. Also the beautiful orange tinted Baily's Beads were visible along the south limb. The sky darkened and the temperature dropped by perhaps 8 - 10 degrees. During mid eclipse, a single bead remained visible at our 1 km site and did not vanish. We thus did not have totality. Isao Sato's camcorder had some problem with the recording heads and during mid eclipse he was yelling out something in Japanese. At Wayne Warren's site 2 km inside the limit they experienced several seconds of totality.
The eclipse was a wonderful experience. Even from the eclipse limits, the red/orange tint of the prolonged Baily's Beads was a beautiful sight along with the solar corona.
Richard Nugent
IOTA - Houston
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Full size (15KB) Diamond Ring by Steve Goldberg. Taken from the island of Guadalupe with a 270mm on Kodak E100S for 1/1000 sec.
Full size (29KB) Full corona by Steve Goldberg. Same setup as above but for 1 sec.
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