Ephemeris: 04/05/2024 – A ready-made eclipse projector

This is Ephemeris for Friday, April 5th. Today the Sun will be up for 13 hours, setting at 8:16, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:13. The Moon, 3 days before new, will rise at 6:24 tomorrow morning.

One quick and easy way to view next Monday’s eclipse via projection will be to use a calendar. All those little drain holes are actually pinholes, and will allow you to see multiple images of the eclipsed Sun. Multiple suns will be projected on whatever its shadow falls on. So that’s a quick and easy way of doing it. You may want to plug up some of the holes though, or the images might overlap. The eclipse will start for IPR listening area at 1:58 pm give or take a minute or two, mid-eclipse will be around 3:12 pm and the eclipse will end at 4:25 pm. If you’re wearing eclipse glasses the moon will move from lower right to upper left. If you’re using the pinhole projection method the moon will move from the upper right to lower left.

The astronomical event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (EDT, UT–4 hours). They may be different for your location.

Addendum

MARY CLASSEN of Mountain Lake immersed herself in the partial solar eclipse – getting creative with a colander – displaying a whole bunch of eclipsing suns. (Photo courtesy of Mary Classen) via cross-countiesconnect.com.

The projected view of the eclipse will be upside down and reversed left to right. So the Moon will appear to move from upper right to lower left. Created using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts), LibreOffice Draw, and GIMP.