Maybe don’t put your laundry on during the eclipse, experts say

spoke with experts earlier this week who cautioned against popping a load of laundry on during the partial eclipse.

While it sounds silly at first, power-hungry appliances can strain the power grid at a time when it won’t get as much solar power.

You can read more about it or click below:

Where is the best place to watch the solar eclipse in the UK?

The UK won’t see a total solar eclipse, unlike northern Spain or Greenland, because it’s narrowly out of the path of totality.

By path of totality, we mean where the moon will completely blot out the sun, bathing it in darkness for more than two minutes.

Metro spoke with two stargazing experts about the best places to see the eclipse in the UK.

You can read our guide here, or click below:

How often do solar eclipses happen?

A solar eclipse occurs when the moon slides between Earth and the sun.

This happens because, by some cosmic fluke, the moon is about 400 times smaller than the sun, but it is about 400 times closer to us. 

The clue’s in the name, but ‘partial’ just means the moon only takes a bite of the sun from our point of view, rather than swallowing it whole.

Total solar eclipses – when the moon completely covers the sun – are far rarer, though. Just 66 have taken place in the last century.

Lunar eclipses, when the Earth gets between the moon and the sun, can be observed once or twice a year.

What time is the solar eclipse today in the UK?

The moon’s shadow is racing across the Earth at up to 3,000mph, so everyone will see it at slightly different times.

The Met Office has made an infographic below that shows what time the peak of the eclipse – when most of the sun will be obscured – will be.

If you want more exact timings, try timeanddate.com, a website that shows the time and date in places around the world – including for solar eclipses in your location.