Solar eclipse of January 4, 1992

Solar eclipse of January 4, 1992
Solar eclipse of January 4, 1992
	Map
Type of eclipse
Nature	Annular
Gamma	0.4091
Magnitude	0.9179
Maximum eclipse
Duration	701 sec (11 m 41 s)
Coordinates	1°00′N 169°42′W / 1°N 169.7°W
Max. width of band	340 km (210 mi)
Times (UTC)
Greatest eclipse	23:05:37
References
Saros	141 (22 of 70)
Catalog # (SE5000)	9490

An annular solar eclipse occurred on January 4–5, 1992. 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 the Federal States of Micronesia, Nauru, Kiribati, Baker Island, Palmyra Atoll, Kingman Reef, and southwestern California, including the southwestern part of Los Angeles.

The duration of annularity at maximum eclipse (closest to but slightly shorter than the longest duration) was 11 minutes, 40.9 seconds in the Pacific. It will have been the longest annular solar eclipse until January 2, 3062, but the solar eclipse of December 24, 1973 lasted longer.^[1]

Images[]

Related eclipses[]

Eclipses of 1992[]

An annular solar eclipse (ascending node) on January 4.
A partial lunar eclipse (ascending node) on June 15.
A total solar eclipse (descending node) on June 30.
A total lunar eclipse (descending node) on December 9.
A partial solar eclipse (ascending node) on December 24.

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.^[2] 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 141[]

Solar saros 141, repeating every about 18 years, 11 days, and 8 hours, contains 70 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on May 19, 1613. It contains 41 annular eclipses from August 4, 1739, to October 14, 2460. There are no total eclipses in this series. The series ends at member 70 as a partial eclipse on June 13, 2857. The longest annular eclipse occurred on December 14, 1955, with maximum duration of annularity at 12 minutes and 9 seconds. All eclipses in this series occur at the Moon’s ascending node.^[3]

Series members 17–36 occur between 1901 and 2259
17	18	19
November 11, 1901	November 22, 1919	December 2, 1937
20	21	22
December 14, 1955	December 24, 1973	January 4, 1992
23	24	25
January 15, 2010	January 26, 2028	February 5, 2046
26	27	28
February 17, 2064	February 27, 2082	March 10, 2100
29	30	31
March 22, 2118	April 1, 2136	April 12, 2154
32	33	34
April 23, 2172	May 4, 2190	May 15, 2208
35	36
May 27, 2226	June 6, 2244

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 9, 1904 (Saros 133)	August 10, 1915 (Saros 134)	July 9, 1926 (Saros 135)
June 8, 1937 (Saros 136)	May 9, 1948 (Saros 137)	April 8, 1959 (Saros 138)
March 7, 1970 (Saros 139)	February 4, 1981 (Saros 140)	January 4, 1992 (Saros 141)
December 4, 2002 (Saros 142)	November 3, 2013 (Saros 143)	October 2, 2024 (Saros 144)
September 2, 2035 (Saros 145)	August 2, 2046 (Saros 146)	July 1, 2057 (Saros 147)
May 31, 2068 (Saros 148)	May 1, 2079 (Saros 149)	March 31, 2090 (Saros 150)

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.

22 eclipse events between January 5, 1935 and August 11, 2018
January 4-5	October 23-24	August 10-12	May 30-31	March 18-19
111	113	115	117	119
January 5, 1935		August 12, 1942	May 30, 1946	March 18, 1950
121	123	125	127	129
January 5, 1954	October 23, 1957	August 11, 1961	May 30, 1965	March 18, 1969
131	133	135	137	139
January 4, 1973	October 23, 1976	August 10, 1980	May 30, 1984	March 18, 1988
141	143	145	147	149
January 4, 1992	October 24, 1995	August 11, 1999	May 31, 2003	March 19, 2007
151	153	155
January 4, 2011	October 23, 2014	August 11, 2018