Your guide to an unusual solar eclipse (in US April 8th)

the best guide is the map in the article



The path of the central eclipse (where the phenomena of annularity-totality may be observed) first touches Earth in the south Pacific Ocean at 18:54 GMT, just to the south and east of the South Island of New Zealand. The eclipse starts off as annular, with the moon covering all but 0.8 percent of the sun’s disk, leaving only an exceedingly thin and rapidly narrowing ring of sunlight shining at maximum effect.

Ten minutes later, at 19:04 GMT, the tip of the moon’s dark umbra strikes Earth about 1,400 miles (2,240 kilometers) south of Tahiti, and the eclipse becomes total. No Pacific islands of any appreciable size fall within this narrow path of totality.

Traveling northeast across the vast expanse of the South Pacific, the duration of the total eclipse gradually increases, with the greatest eclipse, featuring all of 42 seconds of a glorious totality, occurring at 20:34 GMT, far out over open ocean waters.

. . .

The thread of this annular eclipse path makes its first landfall in Central America, at the border of Costa Rica and Panama, over Panama’s Azuero Peninsula, barely skimming the southern outskirts of the Panamanian city of David, as well as sweeping over the coastal town of Pedregal.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7359823/

but thanks for posting.

Thanks for posting.

"In New Zealand, the eclipse will be on the morning of April 9, when the Sun will rise partially eclipsed. Maximum eclipse will occur just after sunrise in most of the North Island, with Auckland seeing almost two-thirds of the Sun's diameter in eclipse and Wellington almost 80%."


http://www.rasnz.org.nz/Events2005.htm#Sun1