Sun
Partial Solar Eclipse 12.August 2026 Begin 07:14 pm Lat 52°54´25“N Long 8°44´24“E
Total Solar Eclipse of 1999 – A Personal Account:
On August 11, 1999, I set off for the Saarland region with my car, mobile phone, and telescope. At 8:00 a.m., while near Cologne, my phone rang for the first time; Udo Borcheld, stationed in Kirchheim-Teck, reported clouds. I was approaching the city of Trier when more calls came in. From France, Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, and elsewhere, the reports were consistently "cloudy and rain." My spirits dampened a bit, but the radio lifted them again: Pirmasens—the city hosting the ARD broadcast—reported sunshine. However, the emotional rollercoaster was far from over. Fifty kilometers before Trier, traffic came to a complete standstill! Time was running out, so I took a country road toward St. Wendel—only to find a traffic jam there, too! Thirty kilometers before Saarbrücken, I spotted a few cloud-free patches in the sky. My hopes rose again, though time was slipping away. At 11:40 a.m., the radio reported thunderstorms in Pirmasens. Meanwhile, I was still fighting my way deeper into the zone of totality. At 12:05 p.m., a patch of blue sky and a parking area prompted me to stop. I got out of my car and set up my Meade ETX 90mm telescope. By 12:10 p.m., the clouds had closed in again. I began to resign myself to experiencing "only" the darkness. I packed up my ETX and decided to drive another ten minutes further into the path of totality. At 12:20 p.m., I made a final stop at a parking area north of Saarbrücken—and what did I see? The sky was clearing. Above us was a huge opening in the clouds! I quickly set up my ETX with a 35mm camera. I was able to enjoy the entire eclipse—the corona, prominences, and so on. I deliberately took only one photograph; experiencing the eclipse firsthand was more important to me. This experience will always stay with me, and I will certainly get goosebumps again.
