The Universe: Secrets of the Sun

Season 1 Episode 1

"Imagine that you're sitting in the movies watching very happily something going on on the screen and then somebody in a row in front of you comes across and blocks your view. In the movie theater you might not want that person to come across in front of you but at an eclipse, we're very lucky that the moon come across the sun and we're lucky to have come right across the middle." - Jay M. Pasachoff, Williams College

"We're also lucky that the moon, although it's 400 times smaller than the sun is also 400 times closer to us. This cosmic coincidence means that the two objects just happen to have the same apparent size in our sky, which allows the one to completely block out the other.

This magnificent cosmic event only happens when the path of the moon intersects the line between the earth and the sun. The moon's orbit is tilted slightly, about 5 degrees. If it wasn't we would have an eclipse every month ." - Narrator

"And then, we'll be bored. But we're not bored because most months the moon goes above or below the place where the line goes from the earth to the sun." - Jay M. Pasachoff, Williams College

"So instead of one every month, we get a total eclipse somewhere on earth about once every year and a half." - Narrator