Solar eclipse of May 30, 1984

37°30′N 76°42′W / 37.5°N 76.7°W / 37.5; -76.7Max. width of band7 km (4.3 mi)Times (UTC)Greatest eclipse16:45:41ReferencesSaros137 (34 of 70)Catalog # (SE5000)9474

An annular solar eclipse occurred on Wednesday, May 30, 1984. 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 Mexico, the United States, Azores Islands, Morocco and Algeria. It was the first annular solar eclipse visible in the US in 33 years. The Moon's apparent diameter was near the average diameter because it occurred 6.7 days after apogee (apogee on May 24, 1984, at 01:00 UTC) and 7.8 days before perigee (perigee on June 7, 1984, at 11:15 UTC).

Observations

During this eclipse, the apex of the moon's umbral cone was very close to the Earth's surface, and the magnitude was very large. The edges of the moon and the sun were very close to each other as seen from the Earth. Images of the chromosphere and Baily's beads on the lunar limb, which are usually only visible during a total solar eclipse, could also be taken. A team of the University of Florida took images, about half of which being those of the chromosphere and the other half the photosphere, in Greenville, South Carolina.^[1][2] Jay Pasachoff led a team from Williams College, Massachusetts to Picayune, Mississippi.^[3]

Related eclipses

Eclipses of 1984

• A penumbral lunar eclipse on May 15.
• An annular solar eclipse on May 30.
• A penumbral lunar eclipse on June 13.
• A penumbral lunar eclipse on November 8.
• A total solar eclipse on November 22.

Solar eclipses of 1982–1985

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.^[4]

Note: Partial solar eclipses on January 25, 1982 and July 20, 1982 occur in the previous lunar year eclipse set.

Solar eclipse series sets from 1982 to 1985
Ascending node				Descending node
Saros	Map	Gamma		Saros	Map	Gamma
117	1982 June 21 Partial	−1.21017		122	1982 December 15 Partial	1.12928
127	1983 June 11 Total	−0.49475		132	1983 December 4 Annular	0.40150
137	1984 May 30 Annular	0.27552		142 Partial from Gisborne, NZ	1984 November 22 Total	−0.31318
147	1985 May 19 Partial	1.07197		152	1985 November 12 Total	−0.97948

Saros 137

It is a part of Saros cycle 137, repeating every 18 years, 11 days, containing 70 events. The series started with partial solar eclipse on May 25, 1389. It contains total eclipses from August 20, 1533, through December 6, 1695, first set of hybrid eclipses from December 17, 1713, through February 11, 1804, first set of annular eclipses from February 21, 1822, through March 25, 1876, second set of hybrid eclipses from April 6, 1894, through April 28, 1930, and second set of annular eclipses from May 9, 1948, through April 13, 2507. The series ends at member 70 as a partial eclipse on June 28, 2633. The longest duration of totality was 2 minutes, 55 seconds on September 10, 1569. Solar Saros 137 has 55 umbral eclipses from August 20, 1533, through April 13, 2507 (973.62 years).

Series members 30–40 occur between 1901 and 2100:
30	31	32
April 17, 1912	April 28, 1930	May 9, 1948
33	34	35
May 20, 1966	May 30, 1984	June 10, 2002
36	37	38
June 21, 2020	July 2, 2038	July 12, 2056
39	40
July 24, 2074	August 3, 2092

Inex series

This eclipse is a part of the long period inex cycle, repeating at alternating nodes, every 358 synodic months (≈ 10,571.95 days, or 29 years minus 20 days). Their appearance and longitude are irregular due to a lack of synchronization with the anomalistic month (period of perigee). However, groupings of 3 inex cycles (≈ 87 years minus 2 months) comes close (≈ 1,151.02 anomalistic months), so eclipses are similar in these groupings.

Inex series members between 1901 and 2100:
July 9, 1926 (Saros 135)	June 20, 1955 (Saros 136)	May 30, 1984 (Saros 137)
May 10, 2013 (Saros 138)	April 20, 2042 (Saros 139)	March 31, 2071 (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.

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

Notes

References

• Earth visibility chart and eclipse statistics Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA/GSFC
  • Google interactive map
  • Besselian elements