IN PICTURES: ‘Ring of Fire’ eclipse enthralls observers in Asia

Skywatchers from Saudi Arabia and Oman to Pakistan and Singapore were treated to a rare “ring of fire” solar eclipse on Thursday.

Annular eclipses occur when the Moon is not close enough to the Earth to completely obscure the Sun, leaving a thin ring of the solar disc visible.

While these types of eclipses occur every year or two, they are only visible from a narrow band of Earth each time and it can be decades before the same pattern is repeated.

Depending on weather conditions, this year’s astronomical phenomenon was set to be visible from the Middle East across southern India and Southeast Asia before ending over the northern Pacific.

Hundreds of amateur astronomers, photographers and set up by Singapore’s harbour for what some described as a “once in a lifetime” event.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan due to the dense fog, smog and cloudy skies, the eclipse wasn’t very visible.

Pak Astronomers #Islamabad organized SolarEclipse viewing at F9 Park today. Telescopes, projection method,funnel projection & solar glasses were arranged for #solareclipse2019 observation#APPNews #RingofFire #ThursdayMotivation #ThursdayThoughts #BeautifulPakistan #RingofFire pic.twitter.com/q2JfvGSPa5

— APP 🇵🇰 (@appcsocialmedia) December 26, 2019

I was really expecting to see the #RingofFire in #Lahore but, alas, all I could see was the sky shrouded in mist. pic.twitter.com/hOhXYYrC7O

— Sara Naveed (@SaraNaveed) December 26, 2019

Eclipse? What freaking eclipse?
The sun only now became visible and it's a full sun.
Is the shithole eclipse over already?

— Salman Rashid (@odysseuslahori) December 26, 2019

The next annual eclipse in June 2020 will be visible to a narrow band from Africa to northern Asia.

The following one in June 2021 will only be seen in the Arctic and parts of Canada, Greenland and the remote Russian far east.