A total solar eclipse occurred at the Moon's descending node of orbit between Monday, July 10 and Tuesday, July 11, 1972,[1] with a magnitude of 1.0379. 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. A total solar eclipse occurs when the Moon's apparent diameter is larger than the Sun's, blocking all direct sunlight, turning day into darkness. Totality occurs in a narrow path across Earth's surface, with the partial solar eclipse visible over a surrounding region thousands of kilometres wide. Occurring about 2.8 days after perigee (on July 7, 1972, at 23:50 UTC), the Moon's apparent diameter was larger.[2]
It was visible as a total eclipse along a path of totality that began in Sea of Okhotsk and traversed the far eastern portions of the Soviet Union (which now belongs to Russia) on July 11 local time, northern Alaska in the United States, Northern Canada, eastern Quebec and the Canadian Maritimes on July 10 local time. A partial eclipse was visible for parts of the northern Soviet Union, North America, the Caribbean, northern South America, and Northern Europe.
The eclipse was mostly seen on July 10, 1972, except for the Asian part of Soviet Union and Japanese island Hokkaido, where either a partial or a total eclipse was seen on July 11 local time, and part of the Soviet Union along the coast of Kara Sea, where a partial eclipse started on July 10, passing midnight and ended on July 11 due to the midnight sun.
A team of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union observed the total solar eclipse in Russkaya Koshka, Magadan Oblast (now separated into Chukotka Autonomous Okrug) on the coast of Gulf of Anadyr. The weather condition was clear, and the team successfully took images of the corona and made polarization observations to study its structure and physical characteristics.[3] In Nova Scotia, Canada, the eclipse was clouded out and could not be observed. Besides that, 850 passengers boarded a cruise ship from New York City and saw a total eclipse successfully in North Atlantic Ocean. Many scientists also boarded the ship and did research, and some also gave classes in meteorology, oceanography, etc., which almost all passengers attended.[4] [5]
The eclipse is referenced in the lyrics of Carly Simon's 1972 hit song "You're So Vain." The subject of the song, after witnessing his racehorse win "naturally" at the Saratoga Race Course, flies his Learjet to Nova Scotia to see the eclipse; Simon uses the two phenomena as examples of how the subject seems to be "where (he) should be all the time." Simon released the song four months after the eclipse.[6]
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.[7]
| First Penumbral External Contact | 1972 July 10 at 17:19:47.5 UTC | |
| First Umbral External Contact | 1972 July 10 at 18:28:23.8 UTC | |
| First Central Line | 1972 July 10 at 18:29:24.0 UTC | |
| First Umbral Internal Contact | 1972 July 10 at 18:30:24.5 UTC | |
| Equatorial Conjunction | 1972 July 10 at 19:29:05.3 UTC | |
| Ecliptic Conjunction | 1972 July 10 at 19:39:28.3 UTC | |
| Greatest Duration | 1972 July 10 at 19:43:47.8 UTC | |
| Greatest Eclipse | 1972 July 10 at 19:46:38.1 UTC | |
| Last Umbral Internal Contact | 1972 July 10 at 21:03:06.0 UTC | |
| Last Central Line | 1972 July 10 at 21:04:04.1 UTC | |
| Last Umbral External Contact | 1972 July 10 at 21:05:01.8 UTC | |
| Last Penumbral External Contact | 1972 July 10 at 22:13:41.2 UTC |
| Eclipse Magnitude | 1.03790 | |
| Eclipse Obscuration | 1.07723 | |
| Gamma | 0.68719 | |
| Sun Right Ascension | 07h20m39.3s | |
| Sun Declination | +22°08'59.1" | |
| Sun Semi-Diameter | 15'43.9" | |
| Sun Equatorial Horizontal Parallax | 08.6" | |
| Moon Right Ascension | 07h21m20.3s | |
| Moon Declination | +22°48'27.6" | |
| Moon Semi-Diameter | 16'08.2" | |
| Moon Equatorial Horizontal Parallax | 0°59'13.3" | |
| ΔT | 42.8 s |
See also: Eclipse cycle. 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.