On 1st August 2008 there will be a total eclipse of the Sun, visible from Canada, northern Greenland, Svalbard, the Barents Sea, Russia, Mongolia and China. From the whole of the British Isles observers will see a partial solar eclipse, with between 1/10th and 1/3rd of the Sun obscured by the Moon.

Total solar eclipses take place when the Earth, Moon and Sun are aligned and the shadow of the Moon touches the surface of the Earth. At mid-eclipse, observers within the lunar shadow briefly see totality, where the silhouette of the Moon completely covers the Sun, revealing the beautiful outer solar atmosphere or corona reports Science Daily.

At its broadest, in this eclipse the lunar shadow is only 237 km (148 miles) wide but the shadow describes a path thousands of km long, traced out as the Earth rotates. The path begins in northeastern Canada, where observers will see the eclipse at sunrise, and then crosses northern Greenland, the Arctic, Barents Sea, Russia and Mongolia before ending in China where the eclipse is visible at sunset. On the ground the maximum duration of totality is 2 minutes 27 seconds but observers away from the centre of the track and at either end will see a significantly shorter event.

Away from the path of the total eclipse the Sun is only partly obscured by the Moon. This partial eclipse is visible across a large part of the northern hemisphere, including much of Europe and the whole of the UK, where it will take place in the morning.

Read more here: Solar Eclipse on the Morning of August 1st  

Check out the NASA website to see the path of the Solar eclipse on Friday, 2008 August 01, a total eclipse of the Sun is visible from within a narrow corridor that traverses half the Earth. The path of the Moon’s umbral shadow begins in Canada and extends across northern Greenland, the Arctic, central Russia, Mongolia, and China. A partial eclipse is seen within the much broader path of the Moon’s penumbral shadow, which includes northeastern North America, most of Europe and Asia. Check Here: NASA Eclipse Web Site.