Best place to watch
A few minutes of night, in daylight
2 hr 12 min from end to end, and 2 min 25 sec in the middle that are like nothing else.
C1 · First contact
A notch on the edge of the disc
The Moon bites into the disc, and the daylight does not shift for another twenty minutes.
Partial phase
The crescent closes
Half the Sun is gone and nothing has changed: the eye compensates. Past 80 %, the light gives all at once.
The last seconds
Baily's beads, then the diamond ring
The last thread of photosphere breaks into beads between the lunar mountains. The landscape falls away.
Totality
The corona appears
The horizon keeps an orange ring all round — that is daylight, elsewhere. The brightest stars come out.
During totality, and during it alone, the corona is visible to the naked eye; from the first returning ray, protection is necessary again.
Maximum
From here, the Sun does not disappear
To see the corona you have to be inside the shadow's path. Outside it, even at 99 %, it is day.
C3 · Exit
The diamond ring, in reverse
The photosphere returns on the other side. The light climbs back the way it fell; it is the eye that takes longer to catch up.
C4 · Last contact
Over
The disc is whole again. At any one spot a total eclipse comes round every three to four centuries on average — and sometimes the very next year.
Looking at the Sun requires ISO 12312-2 certified protection.
Out of reach
No eclipse visible from here
From this place, the Sun and the Moon do not meet above the horizon. There is nothing to unfold.
The sky is rising