Total solar eclipse: the Sun a black circle framed by an ethereal corona. Dark enough to see stars, and for birds to go to sleep – yet an eerie darkness unlike night. The Sun can also be eclipsed on other Solar System planets as long as they have moons. But what would we see from our own Moon?

Are There Solar Eclipses on the Moon

You don't have to be on a heavenly body to see an eclipse. You don't even have to be a person.

Japan's Hinode satellite captured an image of a solar eclipse. On July 22, 2009, a total eclipse of the Sun was visible from within a narrow corridor that traverses half of Earth. A partial eclipse was seen within the much broader path of the Moon's penumbral shadow, which includes most of eastern Asia, Indonesia, and the Pacific Ocean.

Image credit: NASA/JAXA

NASA astronaut Don Petit took this picture of Earth during a solar eclipse. The Moon's shadow moves across the Earth. People in the shadowed area would have been able to see the eclipse.

This photo looks like any old partial eclipse, but it records the first eclipse seen from space. The crew of Gemini XII took the picture. They were astronauts James Lovell Jr. and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin Jr.

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On the way home from the Moon in November 1969, the Earth moved between the Apollo 12 spacecraft and the Sun, creating this solar eclipse.

The photograph was taken with a 16mm motion picture camera. Aboard Apollo 12 were astronauts Charles Conrad Jr., commander; Richard F. Gordon Jr., command module pilot; and Alan L. Bean, lunar module pilot.

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From Emily Lakdawalla:

Here is an animated gif of the four pictures the LRO took of the Earth during the solar eclipse.

At first glance, this photo looks as though Jackson Pollack might have been busy painting. But it's a photo of the full Earth as seen from the Moon during the August 21st solar eclipse. The image comes courtesy of NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The black blodge over the eastern USA is the Moon's shadow. It's centered over Hopkinsville, Kentucky at 1:25:30pm Central Daylight Time.

Credit: Image Credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State Univ. / Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter