4 December 2021
2021
Antarctica
Totality over the ice. A polar eclipse in the season of continuous light, observed at the edge of the world.
On 4 December 2021 the umbra crossed the Antarctic continent. Few totalities are more remote. Instruments and people had to reach the ice, survive the weather, and be ready for a few minutes in which the polar sky would darken in the season of continuous daylight.
The corona observed from high southern latitudes is the same physical object studied in Chile, Mexico, or Oregon — but the observing conditions are not. Polar atmospheric stability, a low Sun, and the logistics of the ice all shape what can be measured.
Expeditions like this are why the group is named for Sherpas: the science is only possible if the equipment arrives, aligned and cold-tested, at a place most observatories will never go.