An annular solar eclipse occurred at the Moon's ascending node of orbit on Saturday, March 18, 1950,[1] with a magnitude of 0.962. 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 3.8 days before apogee (on March 22, 1950, at 10:50 UTC), the Moon's apparent diameter was smaller.[2]
It will be unusual in that while it is an annular solar eclipse, it is not a central solar eclipse. A non-central eclipse is one where the center-line of annularity does not intersect the surface of the Earth (when the gamma is between 0.9972 and 1.0260). Instead, the center line passes just above the Earth's surface. This rare type occurs when annularity is only visible at sunset or sunrise in a polar region.
Annularity was visible from a part of Antarctica. A partial eclipse was visible for extreme southern South America, Antarctica, and Southern Africa. This was the last of 54 umbral solar eclipses in Solar Saros 119.
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]
| First Penumbral External Contact | 1950 March 18 at 13:11:15.9 UTC | |
| Equatorial Conjunction | 1950 March 18 at 14:27:07.9 UTC | |
| First Umbral External Contact | 1950 March 18 at 15:09:02.7 UTC | |
| Ecliptic Conjunction | 1950 March 18 at 15:20:29.9 UTC | |
| Greatest Eclipse | 1950 March 18 at 15:32:01.3 UTC | |
| Last Umbral External Contact | 1950 March 18 at 15:55:41.2 UTC | |
| Last Penumbral External Contact | 1950 March 18 at 17:53:16.2 UTC |
| Eclipse Magnitude | 0.96198 | |
| Eclipse Obscuration | - | |
| Gamma | −0.99880 | |
| Sun Right Ascension | 23h50m43.1s | |
| Sun Declination | -01°00'22.1" | |
| Sun Semi-Diameter | 16'03.9" | |
| Sun Equatorial Horizontal Parallax | 08.8" | |
| Moon Right Ascension | 23h52m29.2s | |
| Moon Declination | -01°48'04.0" | |
| Moon Semi-Diameter | 14'55.6" | |
| Moon Equatorial Horizontal Parallax | 0°54'47.0" | |
| ΔT | 29.2 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.
| April 2 Descending node (full moon) | ||
| Annular solar eclipse Solar Saros 119 | Total lunar eclipse Lunar Saros 131 |