Explanation:
A hole crossed the Sun for a few minutes this month, as seen across a thin swath of planet Earth.
The event on January 15 was actually an annular solar eclipse, and the
hole was really Earth's Moon, an object whose
dark half may appear even darker when compared to the
tremendously bright Sun.
The Moon was too far from Earth to create a
total solar eclipse, but instead left
well placed observers with a bright surrounding circle called the
ring of fire.
Pictured above was a complete
solar annular eclipse sequence as seen above the
Ananda Temple in
Bagan,
Myanmar.
The image of the ancient temple, built around the year 1100,
was taken after sunset on the same day of
the eclipse.
The next solar eclipse will be a
total solar eclipse during 2010 July.
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