Penza, 20 March 2015. PenzaNews. The citizens of Penza witnessed a solar eclipse that took place on Friday, March 20. The people used various items, such as special color filters, glasses, smoked glass shards, floppy disks, old photographic film records, and even colanders, to see how the Moon blocks a portion of the sun’s disk.

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According to available data, this full solar eclipse is the largest since 1999. However, the eclipse was visible in full only on the Faroe islands and the Spitsbergen (Svalbard) archipelago. The natural phenomenon was also visible in Europe, Northern Africa, and Russia.

The eclipse lasted the longest on the shores of Iceland, for a total of 2 minutes 47 seconds.

Based on reports from various researchers, The eclipse ranged from 58% to 65% in Moscow, from 73% to 78% in St. Petersburg, and from 87% to 91% in Murmansk.

The eclipse started approximately at 12.10 am in the European part of Russia.