Eclipse Q&A with Bill Nye - What is an annular eclipse?

Annular eclipses are a very special kind of solar eclipse. Learn what they are, how they work, and why they're awesome. More eclipse info: https://www.planetary.org/eclipse

Transcript

"Hey, Bill, what is an annular eclipse?"

The Moon's orbit around the Earth isn't quite a circle. Instead, it's an ellipse. So sometimes it's a little closer to the Earth than other times. If the Moon happens to be orbiting a little farther from the Earth, it doesn't quite block the Sun completely. Instead, you would see a fiery ring in the sky like this.

And so we get what we call an annular eclipse. Annular from the Latin word for ring. It's cool. It's going to be a totally awesome annular eclipse. We'll see you out there.