Asia set for total solar eclipse

MILLIONS of people in Asia will see the longest total solar eclipse this century on Wednesday as swaths of India and China are plunged into darkness, reports BBC
Scores of amateur stargazers and scientists will travel long distances for the eclipse, which will last for about five minutes.
The eclipse will first appear in the Gulf of Khambhat just north of Mumbai.
It will move east across India, Nepal, Burma, Bangladesh, Bhutan and China before hitting the Pacific.
The eclipse will cross some southern Japanese islands and will last be visible from land at Nikumaroro Island in the South Pacific nation of Kiribati.
Elsewhere, a partial eclipse will be visible across much of Asia.
The previous total eclipse, in August 2008, lasted two minutes and 27 seconds. This one will last six minutes and 39 seconds at its maximum point.
Alphonse Sterling, a Nasa astrophysicist who will be following the eclipse from China, scientists are hoping data from the eclipse will help explain solar flares and other structures of the sun and why they erupt.
"We'll have to wait a few hundred years for another opportunity to observe a solar eclipse that lasts this long, so it's a very special opportunity," Shao Zhenyi, an astronomer at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory in China said.