Hi All,
I'm having a lot of trouble with email over here. Could someone please do me a favour and copy, paste and forward the below text to Gary Seronik (Contributing Editor S&T) at
gary@garyseronik.com
Hi Gary,
Just a note for you to forward on to anyone at S&T who might be interested – we saw it and it was nothing short of miraculous circumstances.
I just read the story by Robert and their experience and we went through a very similar process. The night before, we of the Sutherland Astronomical Society Eclipse Tour held a "war council" because the chances of seeing it were pretty small. We considered leaving the hotel at Hangzhou at 3am and driving 4 or more hours west in the two busses where some seemed to think there was a marginally better chance. Just about all of the 80-odd in the tour organised by our society voted and we decided about 85% to 15% to stay with the original plan – to observe at the ecological gardens near Jiaxing, about ˝ way between Shanghai & Hangzhou. It seemed like a big investment with little to no potential return. We were very close to the centre-line about 50km from the coast.
We left the hotel at 5.30am and it was raining lightly and heavy cloud. It showered on and off for the 90 minute drive – no sign of the Sun at all.
About 15 mins after we arrived at the Gardens (where there were 100’s of others observing from all round the world) we walked in sometimes heavy rain to our spot. About ˝ way on the 1km walk we were with some Japanese amateurs when the Sun peeked out for about 10 seconds and disappeared again. Over the next 90mins we had thunder, tropical downpours, drizzle and heavy clouds. First contact and about an hour of the partial phases slipped by and it looked absolutely hopeless. 30mins to go we had another heavy shower and I’d given up completely – as we all had. That rain stopped with only 20 mins to go …
About 15 mins to go we noticed a large slightly lighter patch in the clouds coming from the south that as it approached I saw it looked faintly blue – incredulous. With only 5 mins to go this patch finally arrived at the Sun and we saw the slim crescent – I looked back over our shoulder to the south and there it was – a huge patch of unmistakably hazy-blue sky. I couldn’t believe it. We were completely without hope and now …
I turned to my wife after another look south and said “ I don’t believe this, we ‘re going to scam this thing.” I started to cry as we approached the last minute. The light dimmed, turned slightly golden and as I relieve these moments while typing, my eyes are moist again with emotion because it seemed we were about to pluck the greatest pearl from beyond any hope. We had one tiny cloud scud across the eclipse from the NE in the final 15 seconds before totality hit and then …
We saw Bailey’s Beads and the diamond ring in clear sky.
We saw every last drop of 5.57 of totality in clear sky with a bit of high-haze.
We saw the beads and a magnificent diamond ring to finish.
We saw the whole of totality completely un-interrupted.
The crescent waxed and 3 minutes later the clouds took it all away. 10 mins later it rained again and we didn’t see the Sun again all day. Heavy showers and steamy all day.
Incredible.
Unbelievable.
It was quite simply miraculous.
We had about 15 mins of “sunshine” the whole day, and it was precisely centred over the 6 minutes of totality. As I sit here I am still shaking my head. I just can’t believe it.
I will never, never, never, ever complain about the weather for observing again. Period. I owe the weather big, big, big time.
We are having a ball over here – be home in about 10 days.
Best,
Les D
so now he's got 2
I can just hear your voice ringing out at Bargo "Oh what wonderful cloud. How I love standing out in the dark at night under a starless sky. Please precipitate on my primary mirror."
