Solar eclipse of February 4, 1981


An annular solar eclipse occurred at the Moon's descending node of the orbit on February 4–5, 1981. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, 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 is smaller than the Sun's, blocking most of the Sun's light and causing the Sun to look like an annulus. An annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region of the Earth thousands of kilometres wide. This annular solar eclipse was large because the Moon covered 99.4% of the Sun, with a path width of only 25 km.
It was visible in Australia, crossing over Tasmania and southern Stewart Island of New Zealand near sunrise on February 5th, and ended at sunset over western South America on February 4th. Occurring only 4 days before perigee, the moon's apparent diameter was larger.
The moon's apparent diameter was 7 arcseconds smaller than the July 31, 1981 total solar eclipse.

Related eclipses

Solar eclipses of 1979–1982

Saros 140

It is a part of Saros cycle 140, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, containing 71 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on April 16, 1512. It contains total eclipses from July 21, 1656 through November 9, 1836, hybrid eclipses from November 20, 1854 through December 23, 1908, and annular eclipses from January 3, 1927 through December 7, 2485. The series ends at member 71 as a partial eclipse on June 1, 2774. The longest duration of totality was 4 minutes, 10 seconds on August 12, 1692.

Tritos series

Metonic series