(ABC News) -- There was a total eclipse of the sun Wednesday
morning, visible only from a narrow strip that began in northern
Australia and stretched across the southern Pacific. North
America is missing it entirely, unless you watch on your
computer. Cairns, Australia, is one of the few places on dry
land where people could gather to watch the two minutes of
totality. Before and after totality, if the weather cooperates,
the sun appears as a crescent, with its face partly blocked by
the moon’s disc. If you were there to see it yourself, there
would be all sorts of warnings about not looking directly into
the sun — but it’s perfectly safe to look directly at your
screen. NASA has posted more information from Fred Espanek, its
resident eclipse expert. As they point out, the rules of orbital
mechanics dictate that there must be between two and seven solar
or lunar eclipses every year, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be
in a place you can reach. Typically, any given spot on the
planet gets a total solar eclipse on