Annular eclipse on February 17

The first eclipse of 2026 was a great one! On February 17, an annular eclipse took place. This is an eclipse where the appparent diameter of the occulting Moon is smaller than that of the Sun, making the Sun appear as a ring (annulus in latin). Unfortunately, from Earth, annularity was only visible over Antarctica. Given clear skies, observers in Argentina, Chili and much of Southern Africa were able to see a partial eclipse. 

From space, the view was again quite different! Thanks to its fast sun-synchronous orbit, PROBA2 crosses the eclipse zone multiple times, allowing it to capture several unique perspectives. During its second passage, just over 93% of the solar disk was occulted by the Moon in an annular eclipse, producing the striking “ring of fire” effect. This was followed up by a nearly total eclipse in the third passage. To top it off, we observed two small eclipses during the first and the fourth passages. We were spoiled!

Click here to view a simulation of the expected eclipse as seen from the SWAP telescope.

Planned Observations

LYRA Observations

As with earlier eclipses, LYRA conducted a dedicated campaign using one of its backup units to obtain higher-quality measurements. The resulting data will be stored in the event directory.

SWAP Observations

SWAP operated in high-cadence mode, capturing on average one image every 20 seconds. Calibrated PNG images and movies of the event are made available in the same directory.

Click on the image below for a movie that shows the SWAP observations for all passages.

Data Use Policy

Contacting the PROBA2 Team