Turn on both the Sun and Moon. Set the field to 15° and center the field on the Sun. Set the date for March 1, 2003. Set the animation step size to 24 hours. Move ahead one step at a time until the Moon passes the Sun. Then set the step size to 15 minutes and move back and forth in time until you find the closest approach of the Sun and Moon. Measure the angular separation of the Sun and Moon and the date. Then reset the step size to 24 hours and step ahead until the Moon again passes the Sun. Again find the date and distance of closest approach. Repeat until you find a closest approach of 40 minutes of arc or less. Do you think this is close enough for a solar eclipse to occur? Check Table 9.2 to see if you have found the date of a solar eclipse. Set your geographical location to Iceland and see what happens to the images of the Sun and Moon. Move forward and backward in time to see if an eclipse occurs.
