at 4:16 PM by Mallory Schnell

A Special Vernal Equinox

Today marked the first day of spring with the vernal equinox, but many other occurrences made the day even more special. At 6:45 pm EDT, the sun will appear directly overhead the equator, but all latitudes will experience about 12 hours of daylight and darkness. According to an article written by Capital Weather Gang, those of us in the Northern Hemisphere will be seeing more dramatic increases in daylight during the next few weeks.

In addition to the vernal equinox, today coincided with a total solar eclipse and a supermoon. There hasn’t been a solar eclipse on an equinox since 1662 (timeanddate.com)! The following was written in a recent article by Capital Weather Gang:

The total eclipse was visible from points in the North Atlantic, south of Iceland, on the Faroe Islands north of the U.K., and Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago halfway between northern Europe and the North Pole. But it could also be seen in partial form across northwest Africa, most of Europe and northern Asia. It reached the point of greatest eclipse at 4:45 a.m. ET.

Beautiful pictures were captured from the eclipse, some of which are highlighted below: