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A partial solar eclipse is shown in Santiago, Chile, on December 14, 2020 (Reuters).
SANTIAGO – Tourists in central Chile hoping to experience a total solar eclipse saw day turn into night shortly after noon on Monday, though fog and rain clouds obscured the sky across much of the region, disappointing some tourists.
A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between the Earth and the sun, submerging the area where this happens in darkness. It occurs only rarely in a certain place in the world.
More than 100,000 tourists traveled to the popular lakeside towns of Pucón and Villarrica, as well as various beach communities along the central Pacific coast to view the eclipse, defying a recent surge in COVID-19 cases. in Chile, according to official reports.
Although clouds made viewing difficult, the moon completely obscured the sun across a narrow 90-kilometer (56-mile) swath of Argentina and Chile around 1 p.m. local time (1600 GMT), to cheers and applause from tourists. parka dresses that stood out. in the rain to observe the rare astronomical phenomena.
“It was incredibly strange, it suddenly started to get dark, just like that,” said Chilean tourist Vicente Bustamante, who said the experience was worth it even without seeing the eclipse itself.
The best view took place in the driest north of Chile, where citizens of the capital, Santiago, took to the streets under clear skies to see the moon partially overtake the sun.
Chile saw another full solar eclipse in its northern desert in July 2019, the first in that region since 1592, according to the Chilean Astronomy Society.
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