Four eclipses in 2021, two to be visible in India
Indore: There will four eclipses in 2021, including one total solar eclipse and one total lunar eclipse, but only two will be visible from India, Ujjain-based Jiwaji Observatory's Superintendent Dr Rajendraprakash Gupt said on Sunday.
He told PTI that the first of these events will be on May 26, and will be seen in parts of West Bengal, coastal Odisha and in the north-eastern states, except Sikkim, as the moon is visible earlier in these places than other parts of the country.
"The earth will cover the moon by 101.6 per cent during this astronomical event," he said. A total lunar eclipse occurs when the earth comes between the sun and the moon.
Gupt said the annular solar eclipse on June 10 will not be visible in India, and in this event, the moon will come between the sun and earth, leading to the sun getting covered 94.3 per cent and being seen as a 'ring of fire'.
He said the partial lunar eclipse, on November 19, can be seen from Arunachal Pradesh and some parts of Assam for a very short period.
"At the peak of this event, 97.9 per cent of the moon will be seen covered by the earth's shadow. The total solar eclipse on December 4, the last of 2021, will, however, not be visible from India," he added.
This year, there were two solar and four lunar eclipses.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
