Diamond Ring eclipse - 14 Nov 2012

This "Diamond Ring effect" photo is one of the many photos I have taken during my one and only time I have experienced a Total Solar eclipse to date.

I made sure that I was up in Cairns on 14th November 2012. I arrived the day before to a overcast location. I found a perfect spot on the coast from where I would see the eclipse and camped out in the car... viewing spot preservation :-). Before catching a few hours of ZZZs I did setup the equipment that I was using for the capture of the momentous event and covered it up in plastic, which was lucky because it started to rain during the night as I was trying to go into sleep mode.

The rain was making me lose hope of seeing anything but I was lucky, at sunrise rain stopped and just before the stars of the eclipse the clouds miraculously parted for the event.... as the clouds returned immediately as the eclipse ended.... some one up there was smiling at me.

The vast majority of the spectators, including Television crews, NASA and CSIRO scientists, went about 45 minutes further north, to Port Douglas, since that location was supposed to have the longest lasting eclipse.. BUT they were completely covered in cloud.

Funny thing is that I studied the weather maps for the few days before the eclipse and determined that Townsville will be the best chance to see the eclipse, but at less than 20 seconds for totality I though that the next best chance was Cairns, so I risked it...

Couple of days prior I contacted various people, including the morning program that was heading to Port Douglas and warned them that Port Douglas will be overcast and Cairns has the best chance of filming the eclipse.. their reply "NASA will be there and they know more than you"... "fine" I thought but when I was informed that Port Douglas was covered, I sent a screen shot of my DSLR screen to that "producer" and had a bit of fun with him.. called him and after he asked and was told that that'is my pic, and I gloated about "NASA knows more huh, hahaha", he hung up... that my friends, is the icing on the ecliptic cake.