Will the partial solar eclipse of September 21 be visible in Colombia? These are the places where the astronomical phenomenon can be seen.

Solar eclipses have always fascinated humanity. Among the most common is the partial solar eclipse , a phenomenon in which the Moon is placed between the Earth and the Sun, but not perfectly aligned.

From our perspective, it looks as if someone has taken a bite out of the sun's disk: part is hidden, while part continues to shine.

Sometimes, this "bite" is barely noticeable; other times, the scene is quite close to the darkness of a total eclipse. The portion of the Sun covered is called the magnitude of the eclipse , and it varies depending on where on the planet it is observed.

One such event will occur on September 21st. According to astronomical calculations, it will be visible in New Zealand, a stretch of the eastern coast of Australia, several Pacific islands, and parts of Antarctica . For New Zealanders, the phenomenon will coincide with sunrise on September 22nd due to the time difference with the UTC meridian.

In Colombia, however, there will be no spectacle in the sky. The country will be completely outside the penumbra zone that the Moon will project onto Earth, so Colombians will have to wait for a future event to look up and appreciate a partial eclipse.

Although eclipses may seem like exceptional phenomena, they are actually not. According to the specialized website Time and Date, these events occur between two and five times a year. Their name usually derives from their darkest or maximum point.

The interesting thing is that even total or annular eclipses don't always look that way from the entire Earth's surface. For those outside the Moon's central shadow—the umbra or antumbra—but within the penumbra , what appears in the sky is actually a partial eclipse.

Solar eclipses can only occur during a new moon because the Moon passes between the Sun and Earth during that lunar phase.

However, not all new moons offer this spectacle. The reason is that the Moon's orbit around Earth is tilted about 5 degrees relative to Earth's orbit around the Sun. Only when a new moon occurs near one of the lunar nodes, the points where both planes intersect, does an eclipse occur .

The process of a partial solar eclipse occurs in three distinct stages: first, when the Moon begins to "bite" into the solar disk; then, the maximum eclipse, when it covers as much of the Sun as possible; and finally, the finale, when it slowly retreats until it no longer obscures it.