Is Earth's solar eclipse unique in the solar system?
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The thing to realise is the sun will look a lot smaller from the outer planets than it does from here. Jupiter is 5 AU from the Sun, Saturn is 10 AU, Uranus is 15 AU, Neptune is 20 AU and Pluto 38 AU.
Therefore smaller moons than ours could obliterate the face of the Sun, and the other big six moons (Io, Callisto, Europa and Ganymede (around Jupiter), Titan (around Saturn) and Triton (around Neptune) are capable of obliterating it for several hours at a time,
Jupiter has 63 moons, Saturn 56, Uranus 27, Neptune 13 and Pluto 3 at the latest census. 165 moons around 7 planets in all, Plus there are at least 80 moons around asteroids and minor planets, The asteroid 87 Sylvia has two moons.
Table of Moons by diameter in kilometres
5000-6000 Ganymede (J) Titan (S)
4000-5000 Callisto (J)
3000-4000 Moon (E) Io (J) Europa (J)
2000-3000 Triton (N)
1000-2000 Rhea (S) Iapetus (S) Dione (S) Tethys (S) Titania (U) Oberon (U) Umbriel (U) Ariel (U) Charon (P)
500-1000 Enceladus (S)
250-500 Mimas (S) Hyperion (S) Miranda (U) Proteus (N) Nereid (N)
100-250 Amalthea (J) Himalia (J) Thebe (J) Phoebe (S) Janus (S) Epimetheus (S) Sycorax (U) Puck (U) Portia (U) Larissa (N) Galatea (N) Despina (N)
50-100 Elara (J) Pasiphaë (J) Prometheus (S) Pandora (S) Caliban (U) Juliet (U) Belinda (U) Cressida (U) Rosalind (U) Desdemona (U) Bianca (U) Thalassa (N) S/2002 N 1 (N) S/2002 N 4 (N) Naiad (N) Nix (P) Hydra (P)
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M$
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M$
1 The shadow is cast on a surface on which we can be stationary. For the gas giants, the shadows are pretty much cast on the cloud tops. Even if you could float on the atmospheres of the gas giants, they rotate so quickly you'd only see the shadow fleetingly.
2 The sun and Earth's moon subtend very nearly the same angle as seen from the surface of the Earth. The moon is only *slightly* bigger. That means that the eclipse doesn't last very long, but the effect is stunning, since the solar corona is visible around it. If the moon were slightly smaller or further away, we would have no total eclipse at all. If it were bigger or closer, we'd miss the coronal light show.
In that sense, we have Goldilocks eclipses--they're just right.
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The photo is a beautiful shot from the spaceship Cabrini as it is in Saturn's shadow as Saturn eclipses the sun. The second link will take you to NASA's website to read more about the image.
http://www.mreclipse.com/Special/SEprimer.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap090111.html
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