the moon will eclipse the sun a couple of days from now

If you are lucky enough to be vacationing in the South Pacific anywhere along the red path shown above then you'll see a total eclipse. When? It is complicated a little by the way we measure time, but at the places under the eclipse it will be Sunday 11th July 2010.

Where the eclipse overlaps the tip of South America the eclipse will begin about 7:45pm so they will be very lucky to see anything because that's after sunset if you are on the ground. People in airplanes or on high mountains might see something at sunset.

Where the eclipse starts, a little north-east of New Zealand, the show will begin at about 5:15pm. It is winter here in the southern hemisphere so that is only a little before sunset.

In 1999 the moon's shadow was photographed from the Mir Space Station.

The yellow lines on the image mark ten-minute intervals during the event as the shadow sweeps across the South Pacific.

In Australia and anywhere left of the vertical dotted line it will be Monday 12th July. We won't see the actual eclipse of course, but the moon will appear to be close to the sun all day.

You can play with a very cool interactive map at
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEgoogle/SEgoogle2001/SE2010Jul11Tgoogle2.html
which lets you zoom in or out and click anywhere along the track of the eclipse to bring up information about times and state of the eclipse at that place.