An astrophotographer traveled all the way to the remote island of Rapa Nui, known as Easter Island, for this week’s spectacular annular eclipse.
Josh Dury traveled from the U.K. especially for the partial solar eclipse in which the Moon appears to block out most of the Sun leaving just a circle known as a “ring of fire”.
There was an annular solar eclipse visible across the United States in October 2023 but the one this week was mostly visible from the vast and largely uninhabited Pacific Ocean. While some people in southern Chile and Argentina were able to witness it, by far the best vantage point was Easter Island.
Easter Island is famous for its giant heads known as moai, monolithic human figures carved by the Rapa Nui people between the years 1250 and 1500. Dury used one of the heads in the foreground of his epic shot that consisted of 21 images blended together in a single frame.
“Photographed from the moai known as Ahi Renga, which means ‘Fire Flames’. This moai served as a prototype for the Rapa Nui artists for the creation of future moai, with detailed motifs present on the moai’s neck. A very pertinent narrative as we observe the ‘ring of fire’ eclipse taking place for one last time,” Dury explains.
Dury was able to access a restricted area of the island thanks to his friend and guide Martín Tuki, the “mystical” Rano Raraoku Quarry where most of the stone comes from for the statues.
“Months of planning went into this picture. Behind the scenes. Martín helped us choreograph and plan this image from a whopping distance of 13,472 miles! I therefore consider this moment an enormous privilege, to celebrate the eclipse with our friend and descendant of the island,” Dury says.
Dury also traveled with his mom to the Pacific whom he describes as “always there for me when I have needed her the most”.
Dury has a habit of capturing epic celestial photos: Just a couple of weeks back PetaPixel featured his shot of a Starlink satellite train sailing in the night sky above and he also captured a spectacular shot of the Perseid meteor shower raining down on Stonehenge.
More of Dury’s work can be found on his website, Instagram, Facebook, and X.
Image credits: Photographs by Josh Dury.
