It may feel like winter has arrived sooner than expected - but a dark cold feeling experienced this morning by most of the country is in fact due to a "spectacular" and "extremely rare" eclipse of the sun, according to Astronomy Ireland.
Up to 75 per cent of the sun is to be covered by the moon in a "particularly deep" eclipse scheduled to start a 8.50am and to finish at 11.15am.
David Moore of Astronomy Ireland says that "more than half of the sun will be covered and in the south-west up to three quarters of the sun will be covered, so it will be noticeably darker and cooler".
The next full eclipse of the sun over Ireland will not occur until 2090.
The moon's shadow will start to glide across the sun at 8.50am. By mid-eclipse at 10am the temperature will drop and it will be darker. The last similar eclipse occurred in 1999. "The moon goes around the earth every month and it usually goes above or below the sun, but twice a year the moon lines up directly with the sun," Mr Moore said. It usually skims the top or the bottom of the sun but every five to 10 years a deeper eclipse is visible.
Astronomy Ireland has asked people to go out and watch the eclipse, then to email it at info@astronomy.ie
It has warned people not to look directly at the sun. It is only safe to look indirectly by punching a tiny hole through paper and looking through it for a few seconds or through specially filtered telescopes. Looking directly through binoculars can cause "immediate blindness", Mr Moore said.
The main "eclipse watches" are at the Phoenix Park in Dublin at the Papal Cross car park and at Ballyphehane community centre in Cork. Other watches are at Horseman viewing point, Boyle, Co Roscommon; Letterkenny and Carlow IT colleges and Millennium statue in Dundalk, Co Louth.
