Solar eclipse of January 15, 1991

Solar eclipse of January 15, 1991
Solar eclipse of January 15, 1991
	Map
Type of eclipse
Nature	Annular
Gamma	-0.2727
Magnitude	0.929
Maximum eclipse
Duration	473 sec (7 m 53 s)
Coordinates	36°24′S 170°24′W / 36.4°S 170.4°W
Max. width of band	277 km (172 mi)
Times (UTC)
Greatest eclipse	23:53:51
References
Saros	131 (49 of 70)
Catalog # (SE5000)	9488

An annular solar eclipse occurred on January 15–16, 1991. 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. Annularity was visible in southwestern Western Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand and French Polynesia. It was visible over Australia as a partial solar eclipse at sunrise on January 16.

Images[]

Related eclipses[]

Eclipses of 1991[]

An annular solar eclipse on January 15.
A penumbral lunar eclipse on January 30.
A penumbral lunar eclipse on June 27.
A total solar eclipse on July 11.
A penumbral lunar eclipse on July 26.
A partial lunar eclipse on December 21.

Solar eclipses of 1990–1992[]

This eclipse is a member of a semester series. An eclipse in a semester series of solar eclipses repeats approximately every 177 days and 4 hours (a semester) at alternating nodes of the Moon's orbit.^[1] This semester series contains only 7 eclipses.

Solar eclipse series sets from 1990–1992
Ascending node			Descending node
Saros	Map	Gamma	Saros	Map	Gamma
111	1989 February 6	-1.56550	116	1989 August 1	1.58396
121	1990 January 26 Annular	-0.94571	126	1990 July 22 Total	0.75972
131	1991 January 15 Annular	-0.27275	136 From Playas del Coco	1991 July 11 Total	-0.00412
141	1992 January 4 Annular	0.40908	146	1992 June 30 Total	-0.75120
151	1992 December 24 Partial	1.07106	156	1993 June 20	-1.56439

Saros 131[]

It is a part of Saros cycle 131, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, containing 70 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on August 1, 1125. It contains total eclipses from March 27, 1522 through May 30, 1612 and hybrid eclipses from June 10, 1630 through July 24, 1702, and annular eclipses from August 4, 1720 through June 18, 2243. The series ends at member 70 as a partial eclipse on September 2, 2369. The longest duration of totality was only 58 seconds on May 30, 1612. All eclipses in this series occurs at the Moon’s ascending node.

Series members 33–70 occur between 1702 and 2369
33	34	35
July 24, 1702	August 4, 1720	August 15, 1738
36	37	38
August 25, 1756	September 6, 1774	September 16, 1792
39	40	41
September 28, 1810	October 9, 1828	October 20, 1846
42	43	44
October 30, 1864	November 10, 1882	November 22, 1900
45	46	47
December 3, 1918	December 13, 1936	December 25, 1954
48	49	50
January 4, 1973	January 15, 1991	January 26, 2009
51	52	53
February 6, 2027	February 16, 2045	February 28, 2063
54	55	56
March 10, 2081	March 21, 2099	April 2, 2117
57	58	59
April 13, 2135	April 23, 2153	May 5, 2171
60	61	62
May 15, 2189	May 27, 2207	June 6, 2225
63	64	65
June 18, 2243	June 28, 2261	July 9, 2279
66	67	68
July 20, 2297	August 1, 2315	August 11, 2333
69	70
August 22, 2351	September 2, 2369

Tritos series[]

This eclipse is a part of a tritos cycle, repeating at alternating nodes every 135 synodic months (≈ 3986.63 days, or 11 years minus 1 month). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee), but groupings of 3 tritos cycles (≈ 33 years minus 3 months) come close (≈ 434.044 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.

Series members between 1901 and 2100
September 21, 1903 (Saros 123)	August 21, 1914 (Saros 124)	July 20, 1925 (Saros 125)
June 19, 1936 (Saros 126)	May 20, 1947 (Saros 127)	April 19, 1958 (Saros 128)
March 18, 1969 (Saros 129)	February 16, 1980 (Saros 130)	January 15, 1991 (Saros 131)
December 14, 2001 (Saros 132)	November 13, 2012 (Saros 133)	October 14, 2023 (Saros 134)
September 12, 2034 (Saros 135)	August 12, 2045 (Saros 136)	July 12, 2056 (Saros 137)
June 11, 2067 (Saros 138)	May 11, 2078 (Saros 139)	April 10, 2089 (Saros 140)
March 10, 2100 (Saros 141)

Metonic series[]

The metonic series repeats eclipses every 19 years (6939.69 days), lasting about 5 cycles. Eclipses occur in nearly the same calendar date. In addition, the octon subseries repeats 1/5 of that or every 3.8 years (1387.94 days). All eclipses in this table occur at the Moon's ascending node.

21 eclipse events, progressing from south to north between June 10, 1964, and August 21, 2036
June 10–11	March 27–29	January 15–16	November 3	August 21–22
117	119	121	123	125
June 10, 1964	March 28, 1968	January 16, 1972	November 3, 1975	August 22, 1979
127	129	131	133	135
June 11, 1983	March 29, 1987	January 15, 1991	November 3, 1994	August 22, 1998
137	139	141	143	145
June 10, 2002	March 29, 2006	January 15, 2010	November 3, 2013	August 21, 2017
147	149	151	153	155
June 10, 2021	March 29, 2025	January 14, 2029	November 3, 2032	August 21, 2036