About Us - a brief history of the Ecliptomaniacs

In 1999 a group of 60 Irish people travelled to Shabla in Bulgaria to view their first total solar eclipse. Little did some of them know at the time that this visit would change their lives for good. A core group of twelve went on to become dedicated eclipse chasers or umbraphiles as some prefer to be called. However the South Africans called us Ecliptomaniacs and this amusing insight into our passion has become my preferred term for what we do, a compulsion to travel the world and "steal" brief glimpses of one of nature's great spectacles for that is what a solar eclipse indeed is.

In 1999 I was on the committee of the local astronomy club and at a meeting one evening the question was asked as to who would like to organise a trip to view the eclipse that August. I remember looking around the people present and was surprised to see that my arm was the only one raised. So in the deep end I went and set about organising a trip which ended bringing 60 people to view their first total solar eclipse. So much organising went into that trip that I had no time myself to even consider what the eclipse was going to mean to me personally. I never really got time to think about it.

It was only twenty minutes or so before totality on Aug.11th that I managed to get some time to myself and realise that I was about to see a spectacular natural event. I prepared myself as best I could by going for a short walk and getting away from the crowds on the beach.

Once the great event had occurred I was hooked! I recall turning around and asking Chris "When is the next one, will we organise a trip to that as well?"

And here we are now, with 4 Total Solar Eclipses "under the belt", two annular eclipses (one clouded out) and planning ahead for the next trip!

Brian Seales

The eclipses we have chased so far -

Date	Place	Latitude	Longitude	Type	Duration
1999 Aug 11	Shabla Beach, Bulgaria	43° 33.854' N	28° 35.407' E	Total	2m 22s
2001 Jun 21	Morombe, Madagascar	21° 44.750' S	43° 21.099' E	Total	2m 17s
2002 Dec 04	Folorodwe, South Africa	22° 27.942' S	30° 28.538' E	Total	1m 24s ¹
2003 May 31	Ackergill, Scotland	58° 28.483' N	03° 06.064' W	Annular	1m 09s ²
2004 Apr 19	Bamboo Club, Madagascar	23° 07.098' S	43° 36.600' E	Partial	(n/a)
2005 Oct 03	Polop, Spain	38° 37.382' N	00° 08.050' W	Annular	3m 53s
2006 Mar 29	Waw an-Namus, Libya	24° 45.268' N	18° 11.914' E	Total	4m 08s
¹ Only the first 10-15 seconds of totality seen, due to clouds ² Nothing of the eclipse seen, due to dense fog

If you have Google Earth installed on your computer, you can download our waypoints list, which shows where we were during the 1999 to 2005 expeditions. There are further waypoints on the home pages for the other expeditions.