Sail past Iwa Jima and Eclipse day! July 22, 2009
BEAUTIFUL weather for our early morning sail past Iwa Jima island, only 8 square miles large. It is accessible for visits only one day a year, on March 17 for the Reunion of Honor. The Japanese have an air base here and it is known as the sulfur island due to the steaming mud pots. There are over 16 miles of lava flow tunnels on this small island. On February 19, 1945, there were 50,000 men in battle here. Less than ½ of them would be alive after the battle; casualties would be as high as 84%. In 1968, President Johnson gave the island back to the Japanese.
We had loudspeaker announcements to announce the exact timing of the entire eclipse. An hour to go, a ½ hour, a few minutes, this is it! First contact, this is not totality. This is now 3rd contact. This is the end… Very thankfully for us so we knew which stage we were in.
1st contact was at 10:03 which means the initial phase of the moon crossing in front of the sun.
The ship would be moving 7 knots forward to give us an additional 3 seconds of viewing time.
2nd contact was at 11:25 which is the actual coverage of the sun and you can view the sun without your special glasses.
3rd contact was at 11:32 and you needed the glasses and could see the “diamond eye” emerge from 2nd contact to 3rd contact. It was spectacular!
4th contact was 12:53 and this was the end of the eclipse.
The sun’s altitude was 83 degrees. The path of the eclipse was 258 kilometers and its speed was 1472 mph/hour.
We found out we even had a couple become engaged during the eclipse -- Peter Rogina and Kirsten Conant from New Jersey!
Much better and professional photos of the eclipse are at
http://www.eclipse-chasers.com/tse2009cc.html
Photos: colors beginning to change as the sky darkens,
a very unprofessional photo I took with my digital camera while holding the eye shield OVER the site
scientists with one eye patch
point of greatest eclipse so you see the path
everyone out on deck setting up their equipment
passing Iwa Jima
