[X] My Assistant

[Stu]

People in China will be able to see a total solar eclipse on Friday. Here in the UK we'll see a partial solar eclipse - not a very dramatic one, but still worth watching. Full details here...

Note: these times are for my home in Kendal, Cumbria, but wherever you live in the UK your times won't be drastically different, and a quick Googlehunt will help you track down accurate times... board members in certain other countries will be able to see the eclipse too, but I don't have specific visibility details. Again, just Google it.

This is just a "heads up" to make sure you all put it in your diaries...

[scalbers]

Ben - hybrid eclipses are fascinating and in these cases the variation of distance to the moon dominates the outcome between the noon and sunrise/set points.

In very approximate terms (and in English units), the Earth's rotation speed is up to 1000 miles per hour, while the moon's revolution speed is about 2000 mph. So if everything else was equal, the apparent slowdown near the noon point should be able to double the length of totality for a noon eclipse near the equator. This is more important for a long eclipse where a doubling can of course add several minutes.

This jives with Gordan's comment about the Concorde that I think was able to "freeze" the apparent motion of the moon.