OVER BEFORE IT BEGAN

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 137, 6 December 1930, Page 25

OVER BEFORE IT BEGAN

The party of American astronomers which travelled thousands of miles to "Tin Can Island," in the .South Pacific, viewed a to tar eclipse on 21st-22nd October that theoretically was over before it began, says the "New York Times." Actually, however, they had one minute and 32 seconds to make observations of the eclipse the path of which passed over only two small islands. It happened this way: Tin Can Island, whose real name is Niuafou, is one of the Tonga Group and lies on the International Date Line, the'imaginary marker where each calendar day first begins. When it is Wednesday on one part of Niuafou, it is a whole day earlier on the other side of this three-miles wide island. As the eclipse path passed across the ocean in a south-easterly direction, the minute and a half of

totality occurred on Wednesday on part of the island a short time before it began, on Tuesday on the other si(se.

In other words the eclipse for the American astronomers occurred "today" before it occurred "yesterday" a little farther on. Or it took place "to-morrow" before "to-day," depending on the side of the date line the astronomers stood. If they straddled the line, they would have the unique experience of viewing the eclipse simultaneously on Tuesday and Wednesday, but even that position would not give them the advantage of lengthening the period of total obscurity to 24 hours. However, the nine members of the American expedition were not disturbed by the complexities of such theories. They had more important business. Ever sinco they landed on the island, the middle of August, they had laboured, setting up their apparatus, and making ready for the event.