Saturday, Oct. 14, Annular Eclipse Is Second of Two 2023 Solar Eclipses

Summary: The Saturday, Oct. 14, annular eclipse is the second of two 2023 solar eclipses and third of the year's quartet of two solar and two lunar eclipses.

animation of annular solar eclipse of Saturday, Oct. 14, 2023: A.T. Sinclair/NASA, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Saturday, Oct. 14, annular eclipse is the second of two 2023 solar eclipses and the third in the year's lineup of two solar eclipses and two lunar eclipses.

The Saturday, Oct. 14, solar eclipse begins as a partial solar eclipse at 15:03:50 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), according to the Time and Date website's post, "October 14, 2023 -- Great American Eclipse (Annular Solar Eclipse)." The time equates to 11:03:50 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). In a partial solar eclipse, the Moon's interjection between the Sun and Earth only partially covers the solar disk.

The October 2023 solar eclipse's path of partiality encompasses three continents and three oceans. The partial eclipse offers visibility to the continents of North America, South America and Africa.

North American visibility is available to all of Canada and Mexico. In the United States, the western portion of Alaska's Far North and Southwest regions as well as the southern Aleutian Islands fall outside the zone of visibility. Western Greenland participates in the partial eclipse's visibility range.

All seven Central American countries and most of the 12 South American countries benefit from visibility. The southern halves of Argentina and Chile, however, are excluded.

Parts of North and West Africa are eligible for visibility of the partial portion of the October 2023 eclipse. North Africa's Morocco and West Africa's Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Western Sahara have eclipse visibility, according to Time and Date.

The Arctic, Atlantic and Pacific oceans fall within the partial eclipse's visibility range. Caribbean Islands and southern North Atlantic and northern South Atlantic islands experience visibility.

The annular portion of the October 2023 solar eclipse commences at 16:10:11 UTC (2:10:11 pm EDT). In an annular solar eclipse, the Moon's position between Earth and the Sun covers only the central solar disk, with the uncovered edge appearing as a fiery annulus (Latin: ānulus, alternatively ānnulus, from ānus, "ring" + -ulus, diminutive noun-forming suffix).

The path of annularity favors the Americas. The annular solar eclipse's path curves across the western United States, southeastern Mexico, eastern Central America and northern South America.

The path of annularity enters the United States via the northeastern Pacific Ocean. It traverses the U.S. states of Oregon; northeastern California; northern and central Nevada; northwestern, central and southern Utah; southwestern Colorado; northeastern Arizona; northwestern, central and southeastern New Mexico; and West and South Texas.

The annular path treks across the western Gulf of Mexico to reach southeastern Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula (Spanish: Península de Yucatán) and then journey across eastern Central America's Belize, Honduras (Spanish: República de Honduras), Nicaragua (Spanish: República de Nicaragua), Costa Rica (Spanish: República de Costa Rica) and Panama (Spanish: República de Panamá). The path dips into the Atlantic Ocean's Caribbean Sea (Spanish: Mar Caribe) between Belize and Honduras.

The path of annular visibility exits Central America and sweeps across the northeastern Pacific Ocean to reach western central Colombia (Spanish: República de Colombia). After touching northern Brazil (Portuguese: República Federativa do Brasil), the path of annularity ends in the southwestern Atlantic Ocean east of northeastern Brazil's states of Rio Grande do Norte and Paraíba.

Greatest eclipse, also known as maximum eclipse, takes place at 17:59:27 UTC (1:59:27 p.m. EDT), according to eclipse predictions by Fred Espenak in "Besselian Elements -- Annular Solar Eclipse of 2023 October 14," on the NASA Eclipse Web Site. Greatest eclipse references the instant of closest passage of the axis of the lunar shadow to Earth's center, as defined by Fred Espenak on NASA Eclipse Web Site's "Key to Solar Eclipse Global Maps." Greatest eclipse occurs in the Caribbean Sea, off Nicaragua's southeastern coast, at 11.4 degrees north latitude, 83.1 degrees west longitude. The path width at greatest eclipse measures 187.4 kilometers.

The annular portion of October's solar eclipse finishes at 19:49:01 UTC (3:49:01 p.m. EDT), according to Time and Date's "October 14, 2023 -- Great American Eclipse (Annular Solar Eclipse)." With a beginning time of 16:10:11 UTC and a closing time of 19:49:01 UTC, the annular solar eclipse lasts for 3 hours, 38 minutes and 50 seconds.

The partiality portion of the October 2023 solar eclipse continues until 20:55:16 UTC (4:55:16 p.m. EDT). Thus, the duration of the entire eclipse, initiated by partiality at 15:03:50 UTC, tallies at 5 hours, 51 minutes and 26 seconds.

The October 2023 solar eclipse numbers as the second of the year's two solar eclipses and as third in the year's eclipse quartet. The year's first solar eclipse occurred as a rare hybrid eclipse Thursday, April 20. The year's first lunar eclipse, succeeding on Friday, May 5, the first solar eclipse, numbered as second in the year's lineup of four eclipses. A partial lunar eclipse on Saturday, Oct. 28, succeeds the year's second solar eclipse and closes the year's eclipse lineup as the fourth and last eclipse of 2023.

graphic of annular and partial paths of solar eclipse on Saturday, Oct. 14, 2023; Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC; 2000 graphic uploaded 2009-11-30 01:30 from http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/ by Tom Ruen (SockPuppetForTomruen): Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

animation of annular solar eclipse of Saturday, Oct. 14, 2023: A.T. Sinclair/NASA, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SE2023Oct14A.gif

graphic of annular and partial paths of solar eclipse on Saturday, Oct. 14, 2023; Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA's GSFC; 2000 graphic uploaded 2009-11-30 01:30 from http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/ by Tom Ruen (SockPuppetForTomruen): Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SE2023Oct14A.png https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:SE2023Oct14A.png

For further information:

Espenak, Fred. "Annular solar eclipse of October 14, 2023." EarthSky > Sun. Feb. 22, 2023.
Available via EarthSky @ https://earthsky.org/sun/annular-solar-eclipse-october-14-2023/

Espenak, Fred. "Annular Solar Eclipse of 2023 Oct 14." AstroPixels > Solar Eclipses > Solar Eclipses: 2014-2023.
Available via EclipseWise @ https://www.eclipsewise.com/solar/SEprime/2001-2100/SE2023Oct14Aprime.html

Espenak, Fred. "Annular Solar Eclipse of 2023 October 14." NASA Eclipse Web Site > Solar Eclipses > Solar Eclipses: Past and Future > Five Millennium Catalog of Solar Eclipses > Catalog of Solar Eclipses > Catalog of Solar Eclipses: 2001 to 2100.
Available via NASA Eclipse Web Site @ https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEsearch/SEsearchmap.php?Ecl=20231014

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Available via Time and Date @ https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/partial-solar-eclipse.html

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