USA Eclipse Bonanza
As stated in the “When” section, solar eclpises occur in complex and unpredictable patterns — for practical purposes, at “random”. On average, though, any given spot on the Earth’s surface will see a total eclipse of the Sun once every 360 years or so. So seeing two total eclipses of the Sun at the same spot in just 7 years would be fairly remarkable — and seeing four total eclipses over a small region of the Earth in just 35 years would be incredible.
However, that’s exactly what’s going to happen in the middle of the United States in the next 50 years — four total eclipses of the Sun will cross a region just 600 miles across, within the space of 35 years. Two places in the USA will each see two total eclipses of the Sun separated by just 7 years. And as if that wasn’t enough, just 20 years later it happens again in Mexico, just over the border from Texas!
Here’s a map that shows the action in the south-east USA over the 21st century:
http://hermit.org/Eclipse/when_usa.html
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I would sure like to be in on this *bonanza*... :-)