Saturday, July 11, 2009

Prayer to the rain gods!!

Firstly, for the record, I stand on the thin line between a theist and an atheist, or am rather an agnostic. (I'll leave it up to you to wiki for these terms!) However, I do have one strong prayer to make - to the rain gods, if any - please run a vacuum cleaner in the sky, for astronomers all over the world, amateur and professionals alike, would like to enjoy a grand celestial show this month! (Yes, of course the solar eclipse!)

This eclipse is the longest total solar eclipse that will occur in the 21st century, and will not be surpassed in duration until June 13, 2132.
The following is part of a pdf on NASA's website, showing the path of totality over a small part of western India, near Mumbai (click to enlarge). The totality band is around 250 km in width, and the time of totality increases as one approaches the central line of eclipse.
(Similar maps for other areas can be downloaded from NASA's website)

I am very excited about this eclipse, as it would be my first total solar eclipse; if the clouds don't decide to screw it up completely that is! To watch totality, a few friends from college and I are planning to go to a friend's home town, Nandurbar. It is supposedly a dry place year round, and does not receive heavy rainfall in the monsoon. Latest updates are that the sky is still pretty clear there, but we are all keeping our fingers crossed!

2 comments:

greySith said...

We're going to be toast. Rather, we're going to be soggy, wet toast ;)

abhi said...

dude please!! the gods might hear you!! lol.. it'll be a damn clear morning, and we're gonna have a fantastic show! :-)