An annular solar eclipse occurred at the Moon's ascending node of orbit on Wednesday, November 11, 1863, with a magnitude of 0.9943. 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 (ring). An annular eclipse appears as a partial eclipse over a region of the Earth thousands of kilometres wide. Occurring about 3.7 days before perigee (on November 15, 1863, at 12:30 UTC), the Moon's apparent diameter was larger.[1]
The eclipse took place in Africa including Namacqualand (then also South-West Africa, now Namibia), Bechuanaland (now Botswana) South Africa (which included the British colonies and the Boer states at the time), Basutoland (parts now Lesotho), Zululand (now part of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa) and portions of Swaziland. The rest took place in the South Atlantic up to hundreds of kilometers (or miles) offshore from South America except for Tierra del Fuego which was included and included the islands, the Indian Ocean, all of Antarctica which many areas had a 24-hour daylight that time, the southernmost areas of Australia along with Tasmania and the southernmost parts of the Pacific Ocean.
As the moon moved towards the left on Earth in Africa, at the peninsular portion, it was seen as it was moved towards the bottom right, then right then top as the axis spun at around the 71st parallel south.
The eclipse started at sunrise close to South America and finished at sunset in Australia, 70% at the Antarctic shores at the Indian Ocean.
It showed up to 30% obscuration in the area of Cape Town and Cape Agulhas up to 99% inside the maximum width of band. The greatest eclipse was in the middle of Antarctica east of the Prime Meridian at 75.4 S, 15.1 E at 8:09 UTC (9:09 AM local time) and lasted for 22 seconds, the maximum width of band was only 42 km (26 miles), the view around it was partly dark even inside the clouds.[2]
Shown below are two tables displaying details about this particular solar eclipse. The first table outlines times at which the moon's penumbra or umbra attains the specific parameter, and the second table describes various other parameters pertaining to this eclipse.[3]
This eclipse is part of an eclipse season, a period, roughly every six months, when eclipses occur. Only two (or occasionally three) eclipse seasons occur each year, and each season lasts about 35 days and repeats just short of six months (173 days) later; thus two full eclipse seasons always occur each year. Either two or three eclipses happen each eclipse season. In the sequence below, each eclipse is separated by a fortnight.
This eclipse is a member of a semester series. An eclipse in a semester series of solar eclipses repeats approximately every 177 days and 4 hours (a semester) at alternating nodes of the Moon's orbit.[4]
The partial solar eclipses on June 27, 1862 and December 21, 1862 occur in the previous lunar year eclipse set, and the partial solar eclipse on March 16, 1866 occurs in the next lunar year eclipse set.
This eclipse is a part of Saros series 121, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, and containing 71 events. The series started with a partial solar eclipse on April 25, 944 AD. It contains total eclipses from July 10, 1070 through October 9, 1809; hybrid eclipses on October 20, 1827 and October 30, 1845; and annular eclipses from November 11, 1863 through February 28, 2044. The series ends at member 71 as a partial eclipse on June 7, 2206. Its eclipses are tabulated in three columns; every third eclipse in the same column is one exeligmos apart, so they all cast shadows over approximately the same parts of the Earth.
The longest duration of totality was produced by member 39 at 6 minutes, 20 seconds on June 21, 1629, and the longest duration of annularity will be produced by member 62 at 2 minutes, 27 seconds on February 28, 2044. All eclipses in this series occur at the Moon’s ascending node of orbit.[5]
The metonic series repeats eclipses every 19 years (6939.69 days), lasting about 5 cycles. Eclipses occur in nearly the same calendar date. In addition, the octon subseries repeats 1/5 of that or every 3.8 years (1387.94 days). All eclipses in this table occur at the Moon's ascending node.
25 eclipse events between April 5, 1837 and June 17, 1928
This eclipse is a part of a tritos cycle, repeating at alternating nodes every 135 synodic months (≈ 3986.63 days, or 11 years minus 1 month). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee), but groupings of 3 tritos cycles (≈ 33 years minus 3 months) come close (≈ 434.044 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.
This eclipse is a part of the long period inex cycle, repeating at alternating nodes, every 358 synodic months (≈ 10,571.95 days, or 29 years minus 20 days). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee). However, groupings of 3 inex cycles (≈ 87 years minus 2 months) comes close (≈ 1,151.02 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.
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