REPORTS yesterday that some people in parts of Turkey have left their homes to camp out for the next few days due to today’s solar eclipse underline the dread that mankind has viewed cosmic phenomena down through the ages.
Since the sun was viewed as a God and lifegiver in ancient times, its disappearance, and then reappearance must have been a frightening thing to behold, and solar eclipses somehow managed to end up as a bad omen, a portent of doom.
In Turkey they may feel they have good reason to worry. Several days after the last total eclipse over the region in August 1999, their worst nightmare came to pass when more than 20,000 people were killed in an earthquake. Some believe that double trouble is ahead as there was already a lunar eclipse on March 14.
Seismologists in Turkey were rushing to calm a nervous public yesterday that there was no link between eclipses and earthquakes. “When we check to see whether there is a scientific or statistical model to link solar eclipse with earthquakes, we find none,” Gulay Barbarasoglu, the head of the Istanbul-based Kandilli observatory, told a news conference.
Although scientists have issued reassurances, residents in the town of Niksar and surrounding villages, some 400km east of Ankara, have set up tents equipped with TV sets, Sabah newspaper said. Niksar was devastated by two earthquakes in 1939 and 1942.
In other areas of Turkey scores of people have arranged to be out of their apartments for up to two weeks to be on the safe side.
Cyprus is also on the path of the eclipse this time around and will have 95 per cent coverage of the sun by the moon at some point between 12.15pm and 3.15pm. The island is also in an earthquake zone.
Ioannis Fakas of the Fakas Astronomy centre said he understood perfectly why people in Turkey might be worried, given what happened in 1999. Fakas said he would not rule out the possibility that an eclipse could spark an earthquake.
Fakas said that since both the moon and the sun affect the earth and all have interrelated gravitational fields, the fact that the sun and moon will be aligned in relation to earth would double the pull in one direction.
He said this could affect tectonic plates, deep within the earth whose frictional movement causes earthquakes.
“During the eclipse these two bodies (sun and mood) are in the same line so the pull is doubled,” he said. This could cause the plates to move.
“Instead of the plates moving after days weeks or months, it means it could happen sooner. This can be the problem with an eclipse but if the plates are steady there will be no problem.”
Fakas said there is a lot of superstition attached to solar eclipses. “In ancient times people didn’t know what was happening and they were afraid. They thought the sun and the moon were colliding and if the sun or the moon was destroyed the earth would be doomed.”
He said however that the ancient Greeks knew astronomy, which resulted in much less superstition when it came to cosmic movement.
Indeed the Greek historian Thucydides wrote: “There was an eclipse of the Sun at the time of a new Moon, and in the early part of the same month an earthquake.” Another Greek writer, Phlegon, wrote that in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad, there was an eclipse of the Sun which was greater than any known before and in the sixth hour of the day it became night; so that stars appeared in the heaven; and a great earthquake that broke out in Bithynia destroyed the greatest part of Nicaea.
Seismologists in Cyprus remain unconvinced. Head of the seismology centre, Kyriacos Solomis said they had not received any alerts from any neighbouring countries, including Turkey.
“We are just monitoring in our areas and movement is currently it is at normal levels,” he said. Asked if there was link between eclipses and earthquakes Solomis said: “There is a slight association but this is not something that can be taken as a rule. Usually it affects the release of pressure that is associated with after-shock seismisity of low-magnitude earthquakes. But there is no scientific evidence,” he added.
Astrologers believe solar eclipses signify the fall of the mighty and that a powerful solar eclipse can create massive havoc, in accordance with other aspects in the heavens at the time, “as can be clearly seen by the trail of earthquakes and other disasters associated with the Solar Eclipse and Grand Cross of August 1999.”
Further into the realm of soothsayers, Nostradamus didn’t apparently predict anything for today’s eclipse but this no shortage of other modern-day prophets out there. “The coming Solar Eclipse of 29 March 2006 signifies a malefic spring and summer – especially the month of July. Violence, wars, and earthquakes are stressed in this region at that time,” says one.
“More realisation of what doctrines, greed, power, religion and war can do to the world. The Martian moon will induce more wars and sorrow upon many nations. More deadly confrontations, more greed for power will plague the Middle East and its enemies. A sensational dance of evil will be unlashed upon the world and plague humankind. Notorious foreign people and those in power will die or forced to accept the fact of their deadly deeds and their own limitation. Nature will join adding death. Drama upon earth,” said another.
??
??
??
??
