The Moon can block the Sun completely during a solar eclipse because the Sun is far, far away. Is it then pure coincidence that the Moon almost completely fits the Sun’s outline, or could we’ve had solar eclipses with a much smaller Moon, thus blocking the sun only very partially?

Question

Title.

In: Physics

Answer 1

The Moon’s orbit (like all orbits) isn’t perfectly circular. It has a point in its orbit where it makes its closest approach to Earth (perigee), and one where it’s as far away as it gets (apogee). When the Moon is near apogee during a solar eclipse, it doesn’t completely cover the Sun’s disk. You can still see a bright ring of sun around the dark disk of the Moon. This is called an annular eclipse. About 60% of solar eclipses are annular. This percentage will increase as the Moon gets further away from the Earth. Eventually there will only be annular eclipses.

Answer 2

The moon is 400 times smaller than the sun. HOWEVER, the moon is 400 times closer to earth than the sun. It’s a huge coincidence but it’s honestly amazing. Now to answer your question. The moon can; has been, and will always change its distance from earth. Most evidence points to the moon very; very slowly spiralling closer to earth with each passing orbit. Even the speed of the moon isn’t consistent. Crazy how that stuff works. And even more amazing that we understand it

Answer 3

Yes. The apparent disc of the sun is 400 times wider than the disc of the moon and just by coincidence 400 times further away, making them appear the same size.

If we lived in a galactic civilisation, no doubt people would come from all over the galaxy to visit our planet just to see our strange sun and moon.