Daytime darkness: Total solar eclipse wows in Latin America

AFP

Thousands of people gathered in the Chilean region of Araucania on Monday to witness a solar eclipse, rejoicing in the rare experience even though visibility was limited because of cloudy skies. Skies were clear in northern Patagonia in Argentina, where people also watched the moon briefly block out the sun and plunge daytime into darkness.

Many people wore masks to curb the spread of COVID-19, though they crowded together in some places in Pucon and in other areas of Araucania, 700 kilometers south of Santiago, the Chilean capital.

More than 100,000 tourists traveled to the popular lakeside villages of Pucon and Villarica, as well as to several beach communities along the central Pacific coast to view the eclipse. “It was worth the two minutes,” said witness Diego Fuentes, who traveled south with his family to see the eclipse.

Though the clouds made viewing difficult, the moon completely obscured the sun across a narrow, 90km band of Argentina and Chile around 1pm local time.

Thousands jumped and shouted happily in the drizzle when the sun was completely covered by the moon and then silence descended for a few moments. People again screamed and whooped excitedly when the sun appeared again.

About 500,000 Indigenous people of the Mapuche ethnic group live in Araucania. They traditionally believe that the eclipse signals the momentary death of the sun after a fight with the moon and leads to negative fallout.

Experts said the solar eclipse was partly visible in several other Latin American countries as well as parts of Africa and areas of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Chile saw another full solar eclipse in its northern desert in July of 2019, the first in that region since 1592.