Total Solar Eclipse eFlight 04 December 2021
For the 04 December 2021 total solar eclipse, there was not much choice where and how to observe the total solar eclipse. On Antarctica, Union Base Glacier Camp, which would be an about 50000$ price ticket. From a cruise, where you not alone conquer the bad weather forecasts, but as well the trip costs. And last but not least observe the eclipse from a plane.
There were two planes scheduled to go and observe totality at sunrise. Due to the fact the Falklands can not accommodate emergency landings for such an amount to people (the two planes together had 90 eclipse observers in total), we had to change into Dreamliner plane choice. In fact more comfy, but also faster, so a gain in totality.
From the plane, at least if you go high enough, and you are in the path of totality, you always have clear sky. The Dreamliner I was in, was on 41000 feet, while the other parallel, at 40000 feet.
The intercept was earlier as what we had in plan for the smaller planes. So the plane turned into the right sun position direction when partial phase was already progressed. Totality was earlier as well. A beautiful, but rather symmetric corona, with a big streamer at 12 o'clock and one at about 3 o'clock. Mercury, close to the right was easily visible.
I had a simple iPhone taped to the flat and tall clear window and recordered totality. A footage of about 7 minutes in total, of which about 2 minutes of totality. See the unedited iPhone footage at https://youtu.be/JFNJQFUXXiQ
I observed with the naked eye and with a 10x monocular. Observed the details of the corona, the prominences and the commencing in and out diamond ring. The latter was bright and long at 3rd contact.
For the partial phase I had a solar eclipse filter for the monocular. And an eclipse shade filter for the naked eye.
The horizon colors where beautiful and the shape of the cone shadow was obvious. See the screenshots of from the footage.
It was a wonderful experience. The Dreamliner big enough to have a window and row for myself. A comfortable observation, in comparison with the small Citation plane experience I had last year.
The planes did set off from Punta Arenas, the very south in Chile. Still prefer to observe solar eclipses from land.
Bob Stephens video (with other plane where me and Derryl were in) - www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVBAWE0IhDU
Television recording (see from 15:02 onwards) youtu.be/MhMbpomJ6qc
Washington Post Link www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/06/antarctica-solar-eclipse-total/
From Xavier Jubier (SEML 25 January 2022:
LA1241 Plane Blue CC-BBE @FL410 (Plane I was in)
C2 07:02:35.1
C3 07:04:26.6
Duration: 111.5s or 1m51.5s
MEI 07:03:30.85 -56.167825°S -45.209159°W
LA1245 Plane Gold CC-BBD @FL400
C2 07:02:35.4
C3 07:04:27.6
Duration: 112.3s or 1m52.3s
MEI 07:03:31.55 -56.162657°S -45.246255°W
Gold had a longer totality as it was flying slightly faster and lower during the umbral shadow intercept.
When I get the time I’ll try to release detailed animations, with one hopefully showing both planes racing in parallel inside the umbralshadow cone.
An enlarged true photospheric solar radius has been used, namely 959.98" at 1au, as per my longtime recommendation as it allows a perfect match of the contact times across contemporary eclipses.
Again this time all the videos clearly point to a totality duration of about 1 minute and 52 seconds. So again we have a perfect match to within half a second at most.
For the 04 December 2021 total solar eclipse, there was not much choice where and how to observe the total solar eclipse. On Antarctica, Union Base Glacier Camp, which would be an about 50000$ price ticket. From a cruise, where you not alone conquer the bad weather forecasts, but as well the trip costs. And last but not least observe the eclipse from a plane.
There were two planes scheduled to go and observe totality at sunrise. Due to the fact the Falklands can not accommodate emergency landings for such an amount to people (the two planes together had 90 eclipse observers in total), we had to change into Dreamliner plane choice. In fact more comfy, but also faster, so a gain in totality.
From the plane, at least if you go high enough, and you are in the path of totality, you always have clear sky. The Dreamliner I was in, was on 41000 feet, while the other parallel, at 40000 feet.
The intercept was earlier as what we had in plan for the smaller planes. So the plane turned into the right sun position direction when partial phase was already progressed. Totality was earlier as well. A beautiful, but rather symmetric corona, with a big streamer at 12 o'clock and one at about 3 o'clock. Mercury, close to the right was easily visible.
I had a simple iPhone taped to the flat and tall clear window and recordered totality. A footage of about 7 minutes in total, of which about 2 minutes of totality. See the unedited iPhone footage at https://youtu.be/JFNJQFUXXiQ
I observed with the naked eye and with a 10x monocular. Observed the details of the corona, the prominences and the commencing in and out diamond ring. The latter was bright and long at 3rd contact.
For the partial phase I had a solar eclipse filter for the monocular. And an eclipse shade filter for the naked eye.
The horizon colors where beautiful and the shape of the cone shadow was obvious. See the screenshots of from the footage.
It was a wonderful experience. The Dreamliner big enough to have a window and row for myself. A comfortable observation, in comparison with the small Citation plane experience I had last year.
The planes did set off from Punta Arenas, the very south in Chile. Still prefer to observe solar eclipses from land.
Bob Stephens video (with other plane where me and Derryl were in) - www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVBAWE0IhDU
Television recording (see from 15:02 onwards) youtu.be/MhMbpomJ6qc
Washington Post Link www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/06/antarctica-solar-eclipse-total/
From Xavier Jubier (SEML 25 January 2022:
LA1241 Plane Blue CC-BBE @FL410 (Plane I was in)
C2 07:02:35.1
C3 07:04:26.6
Duration: 111.5s or 1m51.5s
MEI 07:03:30.85 -56.167825°S -45.209159°W
LA1245 Plane Gold CC-BBD @FL400
C2 07:02:35.4
C3 07:04:27.6
Duration: 112.3s or 1m52.3s
MEI 07:03:31.55 -56.162657°S -45.246255°W
Gold had a longer totality as it was flying slightly faster and lower during the umbral shadow intercept.
When I get the time I’ll try to release detailed animations, with one hopefully showing both planes racing in parallel inside the umbralshadow cone.
An enlarged true photospheric solar radius has been used, namely 959.98" at 1au, as per my longtime recommendation as it allows a perfect match of the contact times across contemporary eclipses.
Again this time all the videos clearly point to a totality duration of about 1 minute and 52 seconds. So again we have a perfect match to within half a second at most.