Families are a strong unit that bind together during the toughest of times. There is a family of solar eclipses, known as a saros, that is proving to be the best of the best and will remain famous into the future. A saros is an eclipse cycle of 6585.32 days (18 years, 11 1/3 days or 18 years 10 1/3 days if five leap years occur in the interim) in which an eclipse will occur that is very similar to the one that preceded it.

Saros 139 is the family that made the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse famous and memorable. This saros has a long life and is nearing the prime of its cycle; we are living at a great time to enjoy it. Saros 139 was born on May 17, 1501, with a tiny, brief partial eclipse near the North Pole. This saros is assigned an odd number, 139, to identify it as one where the Moon is in ascending node as it blocks the Sun. The path across the Earth can be traced generally moving from southwest to northeast. Subsequent eclipse paths migrate southward, keeping the same southwest to northeast track. Six partial eclipses followed the first in 1501, each covering more of the Sun. Strange things started to happen to Saros 139 as it approached its “teen years” of its life beginning in 1627. After a series of partial eclipses there was an annular eclipse that became total just for an instant along its path and returned to being annular. The spherical shape of the Earth had brought its surface close enough to the Moon so that the Moon appeared large enough to briefly hide the Sun. An eclipse that is annular and total along the same path is called a hybrid and is very rare with barely 5% of all solar eclipses being hybrids. Saros 139 produced 11 more hybrids with each one having a longer totality along its path and shorter annularity.

Adulthood arrived in 1843 for Saros 139 as it generated its first solar eclipse that was total throughout its path. It only lasted 1 minute 43 seconds, but totality for each eclipse in the future would last longer. The most memorable total solar eclipse for Saros 139 prior to 2024 occurred on March 7, 1970. This author remembers it very well even at age 9 as a crescent Sun locally with totality racing up the East Coast into Nova Scotia, but Saros 139 cannot claim fame to Carly Simon’s 1972 hit song “You’re So Vain”. Her song refers to the July 10, 1972, total solar eclipse, Saros 126, with references to Saratoga horse racing, which is a summertime event, and flying from there to Nova Scotia where the eclipse was total. This author, then age 12, saw a beautiful crescent Sun through high clouds locally that day. Saros 139 produced total solar eclipses in 1988 in Indonesia and in 2006 in Africa where totality surpassed the 4-minute mark for the first time. Finally came the total solar eclipse of April 8, 2024, with totality lasting 4 minutes 28 seconds. It was the 30th eclipse of the 71 that Saros 139 will produce. Future eclipses of this saros occur in 2042, 2060, and 2078, shifting southward across the Earth with each one having longer totality. Saros 139 returns to the U.S. on May 11, 2078, where it will cross the Southeast from Texas to North Carolina, passing over New Orleans, Mobile, Montgomery, Atlanta, Columbia, Charlotte, and Fayetteville, before heading into the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Hatteras. Note that the path is further south than in 2024 and longer as it will last 5 minutes 40 seconds as Saros 139 ages.

The best eclipse of Saros 139 on July 16, 2186, will last 7 minutes 29 seconds, only three seconds short of the longest possible, and the longest in the 8000 years from 3000 BC to 5000 AD. The peak occurs over the Atlantic Ocean, but Colombia and Venezuela will experience around seven minutes of totality. The eclipses drift further south after 2186, and the duration of totality dwindles. In 2601, deep in the southern hemisphere, there will be a total solar eclipse only 35 seconds long and its last total with nine more partials near the South Pole. Saros 139 passes away into history with one final partial eclipse on July 3, 2763. Saros 139 will last 1262 years, creating 71 eclipses, starting with 7 partials, then 12 hybrids, 43 totals, and concluding with 9 partials. What is amazing is that five of the totals will last over seven minutes! What is nice is that we witnessed one of its total solar eclipses in 2024 and some of us also saw the one in 1970. The younger generations may witness its next one in 2078!