My journey to the eclipse began in 1962. It was back then when I learned at the
observatory in Brno that in 1999 there would be a total eclipse of the Sun in
Austria. Since then I had been thinking about the event. It was also on my mind
in the summer of 1971 in Jerewan when I was buying an
MTO lens for a reflex camera with a focal length
of 1.1 m. For a long time I had been worrying how I would get to Austria when we were
not
allowed to travel there ...
Fortunately, this problem was nothing to be worried about in 1999, although
other worries took their place, such as the European weather itself which is not
the best for observing a phenomenon that lasts but a couple of minutes. The
ubiquitous clouds negotiating the ranges of the Alps make choosing an
observation place in Europe a nightmare even for the hardy. To top this Mother
Nature decided to play some practical jokes with us and replaced the mostly nice
weather, that had settled down for a relatively long period before the eclipse,
by two cold fronts driven across the Alps right at the time of the eclipse.
The morning of August 10, 1999 found me sitting at my computer pouring over
the
recent images from a meteorological
satellite and the
weather forecast
downloaded via the Internet from the server of Meteo France. The situation
looked exceptionally bad. The only ray of hope was a small hole
in the cloudy blanket over Hungary, between the Balaton lake and Szeged, visible
in Meteo France's weather forecast. I wanted to check whether other meteorological
institutions were of the same opinion, but they were playing it safe, probably
from fear of risking being blamed by disappointed people, and issued statements
of the "If it does not rain, you will not get wet" variety. There was nothing
left for it but to believe the French. At high noon the final decision was made.
We were going to Hungary, to the vicinity of the town of Paks, which should lie
in between the two cold fronts.
At 14.30 hrs our 8 member strong expedition sets off in two cars from the
Brno observatory. We consistently avoid all motorways, first class state roads
and main border crossings. We are scared of becoming stuck in the predicted
traffic jams. As we are crossing the border from the Czech republic to Austria
in PoÜtornß light drizzle
gradually turns into torrential rain. The falling rain dampened our spirits in
direct proportion to the amount of water falling from the heaven. When we
finally weave our way, at about an hour till midnight, to the Balaton lake the
weather is beginning to improve. We drive around the hopelessly overcrowded
Balaton lake and head farther southeast. At midnight we are almost there. Just
a couple of kilometres from the centre of the totality belt we stop in a woods
where we are going to rough it until the morning. When we lie down on our
carimats, attended by hosts of mosquitoes, we have above us the canopy of the
sky with "millions" of stars and we are overwhelmed by the view of the Milky Way.
The mood is on the rise.
The buzzing of mosquitoes is not the best of lullabies, especially if you
have blood group B. I don't know why the beasts are not attracted by group O.
However, in the end fatigue takes over. The next thing I know I start awake as
light flashes and distant thunder sounds overhead. Before my sleepy head
registers what's going on heavy drops of water fall on the sleeping bag.
Goddamit, the cold front has arrived! But is this the first one or the second
one or ... I wish I could get online on the Internet and download a recent image
from the satellite. We have to seek shelter in the car and catch some sleep
sitting inside and waiting till the morning. Low spirits reach new depths.
However, after eight in the morning a strip of blue sky appears in the west and
extends, slowly but definitely towards us. The front has gone and everyone
cheers up.
Morning lethargy quickly disappears as we get into the cars and drive the
remaining few kilometres to our target looking for a spot suitable for
observation. We find it on the edge of a typical Hungarian field of maize about
2km SSE from the village of NΘmetkΘr. It is
almost at the centre line of the strip of totality, less than ten kilometres
away from the town of Paks. The
weather
looks splendid. The sky is clear with the final traces of the disappearing
front discernible at the distance in the east. How I wish the eclipse happened now!
But right now, the total eclipse is almost minus three hours away. About an hour
later small, under normal circumstances beautiful, cumulus clouds begin to
emerge in the west. We begin to get nervous. A single nothing of a cloud like
this, at the right time and at the right place, and we are done. We carefully
study the line of their movement and develop desperate scenarios of the type:
... immediately before the eclipse hop in the car and rush off eastwards. And what
about the Danube river? There's no bridge. OK, then westwards. Why westwards?
There are more clouds there. All right then ... we stay here.
The
partial eclipse begins and none of us
is interested. From time to time
we do check
whether the Moon encroaches on the Sun's disk in the prescribed
manner but we are much more busy studying the sky, what the clouds are doing.
About midway into the partial eclipse I begin to load the cameras. I am as
nervous as it is possible to be. So are the cameras. Minolta X-700, after
switching off the automatics, refuses fixed exposure times, and simply behaves
confused. This is a critical fault. (Later at home I discovered the camera was
OK, it was me who was confused.) I pick up the standby Soligor camera and load
it with
Fujicolor Superia 800. I will take
photographs of the Sun and its immediate surroundings, i.e. the prominences and
the inner and middle corona, using the
MTO 10.5/1100mm mirror lens. Damn it,
the camera is completely dead. It must be the batteries. I hastily replace the
batteries and the camera responds as expected. I load two more cameras with
Agfacolor HDC 400 Plus. The first one goes into the hands of my older daughter
Hana (14 years old). Her task is to photograph the outer corona which falls
outside the field of view of my giant mirror lens. She will use a Sonnar
2.8/200mm fast lens screwed onto a good old Praktica. The second one will be
given to my younger daughter Zdena (11 years old) who will photograph the whole
sky from the Sun to the horizon. That is why she has Minolta X-700 with the
2.8/28mm lens.
About 20 minutes before the total eclipse the sky is nice and clear with the
exception of one cloud which is speeding directly towards the Sun. Our
nerves are strung out like strings. Then a miracle happens. The cloud changes
direction and floats away unbelievably almost perpendicular to the direction
from which it arrived, away from the Sun. The cooling of the ground in the
shadow area changed the air flow which behaved in a different manner than usual.
I mount a filter made from a large computer floppy on my mirror lens and try
to point the camera at the Sun. Another nervous breakdown! I cannot find the
Sun. At night, when I use this lens to photograph the Moon it is very easy to
find. I aim the lens at the Moon as if it was a gun's barrel. The lens even has
protrusions resembling a gun's front sight to help one's aim. However, when the
blinding Sun, into which it is impossible to look directly, is shining into my
eyes, aiming is reduced to mere fumbling about. Fortunately, even the
fumbling was finally successful. Now I must keep it pointed at the Sun. It is
about minus five, maybe minus three, minutes to the total eclipse. Now it is
quite certain that we are going to make it. The narrow crescent that remains
from the solar disk shines from a crystal-clear sky. In the west we can clearly
see the
approaching Moon's shadow.
It is quickly getting dark and significantly cooler (by about 5 degrees
compared to the temperature before the partial eclipse began). It is
12 hours 50 minutes.
I remove the filter from the lens. Looking into the last of the bright Sun rays
can do me no harm. I precisely focus the lens and try to be perfectly
concentrated. The moment I have been waiting for such a long time has
arrived and I must not mess it up. All of a sudden, without any warning,
the Sun's brightness abruptly fades away and at the rim of the solar disk, which
just a couple of seconds back blinded my eyes, there shines only a sparkling
strip of light justifiably called the
diamond ring.
Its shine quickly dies down and breaks into little bright stars
-
Bailey's beads. These are caused by the
irregularities of the Moon's surface. While most of the gleaming solar disk is
already covered the last sunrays still manage to come through at some places.
What a magnificent view. After a few seconds even the
last bead disappears
and the solar limb adopts a bright red color which also
quickly fades away. The red color belongs to the
chromosphere,
a thin layer of gas, floating above the visible
solar surface.
The look into the viewfinder of my camera will never be forgotten until the end
of my life. A dark, blue-grey sky, a corona glowing with silver light and
beautiful richly red
prominences, floating above
the "black Sun".
The
moving of the Moon is clear to see.
After ten to fifteen seconds it is clearly visible how the Moon hides the
prominences on one side of the Sun and unveils them on the opposite side.
I am aroused from total concentration by Hana's desperate cry. The
wire release screwed onto her Praktica camera got stuck.
I leave my reflex camera, rush off to her camera and unblock the mechanism of the release
in second. On the way back to my camera I manage to notice the
landscape around us and glance briefly at the
sky.
It is dark as when there is a full moon shining in the night, maybe a little
lighter. The corona glows with a pale light around the Sun hidden by the Moon
and sharply contrasts with the dark sky. Down to the left from the Sun
the planet Venus brightly shines and one can also see the brighter
stars. The sky turns lighter towards the horizon
and, above the horizon, is of a yellow-orange color. This is caused by the Sun
shining at a distance where there is currently no total eclipse. I do not have
time to savour the magnificent
panorama.
My younger daughter Zdena equipped with a Minolta camera with a wide angle lens did not
waste her time and so the passing beauty of the contrasts and colors in the sky
during the total eclipse has been captured. Now, quickly back to the reflex camera
as the time rushes mercilessly onwards. In under ten seconds I am back in position
and continue taking photographs. Although I take pictures at intervals of a few
seconds I have time to realize the beauty of the whole phenomenon and imprint in
my memory the wonderful interplay of
colors - combination of red, white
and blue. The
end of totality is drawing near.
My attention is attracted by an
unusually intense
prominence disclosed by the passing Moon. Its striking, profoundly intense
red color reminds me of the sparkle of a deep red precious stone.
How long are 2 minutes and 20 seconds actually? I have been a mountain climber
for many years and lucky enough not to fall anywhere.
But I read in books that people who have survived a long fall say that a couple
of seconds can seem like an eternity. A total eclipse of the Sun seems to have
the opposite effect. Time speeds by so quickly that the end of the eclipse
caught me unprepared. All of a sudden
narrow red
strip of the chromosphere lit up followed by a re-emergence of the
Bailey's beads, this time at the opposite side of the
solar disk than where they disappeared just a moment ago. The
beads merge very quickly into larger and
larger shining areas and then suddenly it is over.
Brilliant sunlight hurts my eyes.
I must not look into the camera's viewfinder for to do this would risk permanent
damage to my eyes. There are a few frames left in the camera.
I expose them "at random".
Exhausted, I drop down on the carimat. For a few seconds the whole expedition
seems to have fallen into a state of apathy and then unbridled
euphoria breaks out. Out of superstition,
I have not taken any other photos except of the eclipse of the Sun. Now I document
the euforia around myself. ... MiloÜ, do you know where the
next total eclipse of the Sun takes place?
In Angola. How much does a flight to Angola cost? ... We'll go, what do you
think? You buy the films, I'll get a Kalashnikoff, ... We talk nonsense and
respectable fathers of families fool around like their offspring.
However, my jubilation slowly cools down and worries settle in. Will all the
photographs come out fine? Was the home-made tripod solid enough? Have I
chosen the correct films? Haven't the Sun strayed away from the centre of the field?
Such thoughts haunted me until the next morning when I was standing at the
developing machine in my favourite laboratory and waiting for endless minutes
before the machine developed the film. Out comes from the machine an orange
strip with light circles in the middle and green prominences and dark corona
around it. It is there. Only now do I feel real, complete elation. In the
afternoon, completely calm, we fine tune in a minilab filtration and densities
to make the pictures as realistic as possible. The machine spits out photographs
which allow us to savour, undisturbed, all the beauty of the fleeting moments.
