Barely two weeks after the lunar eclipse, the Kingdom will witness Friday morning a partial solar eclipse. The eclipse will be visible in Jeddah from 7.38 AM and reach its peak at 8.54 AM .“The Kingdom will fall in the north part of the eclipse strip so we will see only a partial eclipse,” said Hassan Basoura, head of Astronomy at King Abdulaziz University. “It is expected to cast a 300-km wide shadow on the land.” Eye specialist Dr. Yasser Al-Mazrou'i warned against looking directly at the sun with the naked eye. “Looking at the sun's rays can cause serious long-term damage to the retina of the eye and even permanent blindness,” Dr. Al-Mazrou'i said. Specialists generally concur that the best way to a view a solar eclipse is through aluminized mylar film, dark welder's lenses, or using a piece of card with a hole in it to project the image onto another surface to observe the eclipse's movement. Sunglasses do not offer protection from solar rays.
