Total Eclipse 2026

[tom66]

Who saw it?

We lined up our honeymoon to a trip in Valencia during the total eclipse.  Drove out to the mountains near Benagéber and caught my second total eclipse ever.  This one was only one minute long, compared to the one in the USA which was about four minutes long, but it was still magical. 

Photos don't capture the beauty of it so I won't bore you with them. I only had an iPhone and to really capture a good image you need a proper lens and a DSLR with carefully adjusted settings.  But it is just magnificent to see.

And at the moment of totality, a man proposed to his girlfriend, who said yes and was overjoyed - that was very cute. 

I think I am hooked now, trying to work out how to see 2027 in Morocco!

[Tation]

Yeah, from the beach in Ibiza.

Also looking for the right place (and right price     ) for 2027.

[tszaboo]

I got to see a 80% eclipse from my balcony. It was interesting, especially seeing the shadows completely change.
I remember seeing a total one in 1998. We were using welding glasses, that's totally not recommended. Now it was some ISOwhatever approved glass, and you couldn't see the sun corona. But it's safer. Honestly, my vision is getting worse so maybe the safer way is better.

[nali]

We had 96% which sounds good but nowhere near as good as the totality of the 1999 event.

One weird artifact I noticed was that everything had a double shadow due to the shape/orientation of the crescent. I thought my eyes were going bad for a moment 

[tom66]

There was a guy on the same hill we were looking at who was observing the eclipse through the tinted rear window of his Suzuki Jimny.  I was going to advise him that it was a very bad idea, but he didn't speak brilliant English and my Spanish consists of being able to count to 10 and he seemed to be having fun so... hopefully he's alright.

[the Chris]

Went to early, went back home again, nearly missed the ideal moment but made a bad decision on the place to go and found a better spot only after a few minutes past max darkening. Well, it was only like 80% in western Germany anyway so not something I will regret strongly but still a missed opportunity for a better picture.

[tatel]

I agree it's the totality what matters. I remember seeing a partial one in the last 90s or first 2000s. Unless you use glasses/instruments, you see nothing more than a change in the nature of light (reddish, I would say) Totality is some orders of magnitude over even 90%

[SteveThackery]

I agree it's the totality what matters. I remember seeing a partial one in the last 90s or first 2000s. Unless you use glasses/instruments, you see nothing more than a change in the nature of light (reddish, I would say) Totality is some orders of magnitude over even 90%

I don't agree with that. A partial eclipse can be interesting in its own right. One of the things that really struck me as the eclipse progressed was how all the birds stopped singing. I hadn't realised that birdsong is present for so much of the time, and its absence felt really weird and strange - there was a hushed silence with nothing but the faint sound of distant traffic.

Secondly, the nature of the light was remarkable. Daylight is dim at dawn and dusk, and atmospheric refraction gives it a more yellowish, orangey colour. During the eclipse, the light was dim without that colour shift: it remained the colour of ordinary daylight, simply much weaker. I hadn't previously appreciated how accustomed we are to the changing colour of daylight, but seeing normal daylight simply fading in intensity felt deeply strange — almost as though the Sun itself were growing dimmer. In a sense, of course, that was exactly what was happening.

Thirdly, the shadows! The shadow of a tree against a wall is filled with crescents, giving a unique and beautiful effect.



So, I don't agree that a totality is all that matters - a partial eclipse has its own fascination.

[tom66]

Partial eclipse is definitely cool to see, but there's nothing quite like seeing the sun's corona whilst the photosphere is covered by the moon.  It is a very hard thing to describe but it is really emotional and almost spiritual.  And I am one of the least spiritual people you will meet but even I felt affected by it.  It is just like magic seeing two astronomical bodies line up in such a way that an extraordinarily beautiful result comes about.  These bodies being of such extraordinary scale that it is hard to fathom.

Oddly enough we did not get strange shadows in Benagéber.  I think this is because the sun was so low to the horizon that shadows were already stretched far out so distortion created by the partial phases was minimal.  The birds also seemed less confused as it was probably around the normal time for sunset for them, but we still got the strong wind phenomena.  And yes, the daylight is odd -- it's like the wrong colour for the level of brightness.  Very hard to describe!

[paulca]

I got the Sony A6100 out, found the ND filter.  Only 400 but the camera is mirrorless, so my eyes are not an issue.

I got the sun filling 50% of the viewable 24M pixel frame.  You could almost see sunspots but....

Sadly, it would never quiet focus due to hazy clouds... which got thicker and thicker and then some rain clouds moved in.  Literally 5 minutes before overlap and remained there the rest of the night.

[jnk0le]

There was a guy on the same hill we were looking at who was observing the eclipse through the tinted rear window of his Suzuki Jimny.  I was going to advise him that it was a very bad idea, but he didn't speak brilliant English and my Spanish consists of being able to count to 10 and he seemed to be having fun so... hopefully he's alright.

as usual

[Zero999]

The 2026 eclipse wasn't the best. It occurred in late evening in Spain and where there was the longest period of totality, earlier on in the evening, Ísafjörður, Iceland, was cloudy.

If you want to see a better eclipse, go to Egypt next August.

[tom66]

There was a guy on the same hill we were looking at who was observing the eclipse through the tinted rear window of his Suzuki Jimny.  I was going to advise him that it was a very bad idea, but he didn't speak brilliant English and my Spanish consists of being able to count to 10 and he seemed to be having fun so... hopefully he's alright.

as usual
(Attachment Link)

The funny/sad thing is the retina has no pain receptors and so many people who do stare into partial eclipses become unaware of the damage they are potentially causing.  Pain post-eclipse-viewing is likely psychosomatic.

The reason is the excess radiation causes the photoreceptors to produce too many transmitters which can poison the retinal cells.  In many cases the damage is not instant but occurs over the following hours to days. 

It seems from the research into this the majority of people do recover their eyesight as there are unknown mechanisms for recovery in the eye but a few people sadly do lose visual acuity in the centre of their visual field which can be extremely disabling.

So always take care around eclipses!

https://eclipse.aas.org/sites/eclipse.aas.org/files/AAS-Chou-Tech-Report-Solar-Eclipse-Eye-Safety-2023.pdf

[harerod]

We live 11° below the horizon, which was the sun's altitude when the event started. Maximum was at around 3.8°.
So we found a spot on the plateau behind our home. Several people from our and the neighboring villages had the same idea.
An old full-frame DSLR, 400mm lens with ND8000 on a tripod allowed for leisurely watching and taking the occasional picture.
The language is German, the pictures should speak for themselves:   
https://harerod.de/lbr/sternbilder/sternbilder.html#sofi260812
 
It was very nice chatting with other people whom I invited to have a look through the viewfinder. I recommended to keep sunglasses on to protect against stray light.
I could have taken better shots with some adjustment. However, I rather enjoyed the company and concentrated on the exchange with the other spectators.

One couple had brought a pinhole camera, which yielded surprisingly good views. Others had brought eclipse-"glasses".

[Zero999]

There was a guy on the same hill we were looking at who was observing the eclipse through the tinted rear window of his Suzuki Jimny.  I was going to advise him that it was a very bad idea, but he didn't speak brilliant English and my Spanish consists of being able to count to 10 and he seemed to be having fun so... hopefully he's alright.

as usual
(Attachment Link)

The funny/sad thing is the retina has no pain receptors and so many people who do stare into partial eclipses become unaware of the damage they are potentially causing.  Pain post-eclipse-viewing is likely psychosomatic.

The reason is the excess radiation causes the photoreceptors to produce too many transmitters which can poison the retinal cells.  In many cases the damage is not instant but occurs over the following hours to days. 

It seems from the research into this the majority of people do recover their eyesight as there are unknown mechanisms for recovery in the eye but a few people sadly do lose visual acuity in the centre of their visual field which can be extremely disabling.

So always take care around eclipses!

https://eclipse.aas.org/sites/eclipse.aas.org/files/AAS-Chou-Tech-Report-Solar-Eclipse-Eye-Safety-2023.pdf

I could be wrong, but I was under the impression that permanent injury is mostly thermal. The overloading of the retinal cells is not good, but is more likely to result in recovery.

Interestingly, I've heard that the sun can also damage the CCD inside a camera.  Either way, I'd rather risk destroying my phone than my eyes.

[tom66]

I could be wrong, but I was under the impression that permanent injury is mostly thermal. The overloading of the retinal cells is not good, but is more likely to result in recovery.

Interestingly, I've heard that the sun can also damage the CCD inside a camera.  Either way, I'd rather risk destroying my phone than my eyes.

The article I linked is from a Professor of Optometry & Vision Science.  His statement is that thermal injury is rare because the pupil is usually dilated enough to avoid introducing excessive heat into the eye; nonetheless, cases do happen sometimes, when people 'stare' for extended periods of time.  These cases are inevitably permanent.  However, the most common form of damage is overloading the photoreceptors which leads to the "poisoning" effect, due to the excess amounts of blue light.  This can occur in less than a few seconds.  Many people recover from this (no doubt many have experienced the "afterimage" on their eyes from looking at bright lights which is temporary), but a few don't; the reasons for this are not well understood.  Nonetheless, the risk is high enough to warrant significant caution during eclipse viewing.

As for cameras, I pointed my iPhone repeatedly at the eclipse without any ill effects, I suspect modern cameras are well designed to withstand this.  A DSLR with a powerful lens may not survive so well, I've seen photos of the sensors on those cameras being destroyed by misusing them during an eclipse.  CCDs are pretty rare nowadays, outside of scientific applications, but I expect they are more vulnerable due to their charge-based design (easier to overload the receiving elements).

[RoGeorge]

I've witnessed a total solar eclipse in Romania, I think it was in 1999.  We were in vacation at the seaside, in a place called "2 Mai" (the 2nd of May), a small beach at the Black Sea.  It was crazy.  Not sure if it was because of the hype alone, or if it was something physical caused by the eclipse, but it was something "special" in the air.  A lot of strange things happened.

Funny tale, there was a family, parents and 2 kids, camped with one of those mobile family caravans (pretty rare in Ro), with portable TV and everything.  That alone was way out of place (on a nudists hippie style beach like 2 Mai), but most of all, the father was absolutely draconian with his kids discipline.  During the eclipse day, the kids were all prepared, with eclipse protection glasses hanging around their neck, and hyped about the upcoming event.  Yet, when the eclipse moment finally came, the father forced them to watch the eclipse on that noisy portable TV they brought with their caravan, instead of letting them use their eclipse goggles and witness the real thing.

Imagine the whole family watching the eclipse on a black and white tiny and noisy portable TV, with the eclipse goggles hanging around the neck, while the real thing was happening above their heads.