Africa enjoys view of ‘ring of fire’ solar eclipse

Stargazers in south and central Africa were treated to a spectacular solar eclipse Thursday with the Moon moving across the Sun to form a “ring of fire”.

At the eclipse’s peak, all that was visible was a ring of light encircling the black Moon -- but the phenomenon was only fully visible to people in a narrow, 100km band stretching across central Africa, Madagascar and Reunion.

Anyone north, south, east or west of the band experienced only a partial eclipse, or none at all.

The phenomenon, known as an annular solar eclipse, happens when there is a near-perfect alignment of the Earth, Moon and Sun.

But unlike a typical total eclipse, when the Sun is fully blacked out, sometimes the Moon is too far from Earth, and its apparent diameter too small, for complete coverage, despite the alignment.

“I wanted to see it because even my daughters will be too old to watch the next one in 200 years,” joked Jeremy Grondin, who watched the event with his two young daughters in the south west of France’s Indian Ocean Reunion Islands.