Thanks Mark for your thoughts on that. I will look into this a bit more and see if I can come up with anything. I did note a survey this week that said public support for the war was actually increasing. It would be foolish to take just one poll and base conclusions on it though.

I suspect the opposition to the war, once held by the pacifist left will shift to bereaved women who will blame the government for defence cuts that left our service people in danger because of inadequate equipment.

The press coverage is all about British casualties, never about Taleban on the run. They seem to be on a Vietnam narrative.

Matt

The eclipse that initiated the Saros Cycle should be given particular attention. According to Jansky the Solar eclipse of July 22. 2009 belongs to the Saros series 11S, meaning that the initial partical eclipse of this Saros cycle occured at the Moon's South Node. Espenak labels this cycle as Saros 136.

According to Espenak the initiating eclipse occured on June 14. 1360, but as I enter the data into my computor I find myself applying June 22. 1360, time 06.11 GMT. There is a calendar difference here of 8 days for which there must be an obvious explanation.

The initiating eclipse occured on the same day as the Summer Solstice and in the 1st degree of Cancer. That might be taken in comparison with the current eclipse that occurs in the 30th and final degree of the same sign.

The Astro*Cartography chart for the initial eclipse shows the eclipse to be on the upper meridan of Calcutta, Tibet and China. Mars and Pluto are on the descendant of Peking; on the ascendant of Washington. The first outbreak of the Swine flue occured in Mexico. The eclipse is on the lower meridian of this region.
I hope this contributes to the interesting discussion.

Andrew Bevan wrote:

According to Espenak the initiating eclipse occured on June 14. 1360, but as I enter the data into my computor I find myself applying June 22. 1360, time 06.11 GMT. There is a calendar difference here of 8 days for which there must be an obvious explanation.

The Gregorian calendar.

Do you know? I have an old Italian book on astrocartography and they quote many of your works in the bibliography, it's a pleasure reading you here
margherita

This I no nothing of. You could either be mistaken or are simply too kind.

Gjiada wrote:

Andrew Bevan wrote:

According to Espenak the initiating eclipse occured on June 14. 1360, but as I enter the data into my computor I find myself applying June 22. 1360, time 06.11 GMT. There is a calendar difference here of 8 days for which there must be an obvious explanation.

The Gregorian calendar.

Yes, it is the Gregorian calendar. I think Espenak uses the Gregorian calendar also for years before 1582 (when the Gregorian calendar was installed and the Julian calendar dismissed by pope Gregory)

If anyone is curious about it here some info on 'saros series'
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEsaros/SEsaros.html
Here's a table of Saros series no.136
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEmono/TSE ... able15.pdf note the long duration of the eclipses in the 20th century.

Andrew Bevan wrote:This I no nothing of. You could either be mistaken or are simply too kind.

I never lie (or I'm very kind )

"Il cielo in terra" (The heaven in the sky) written by Rocco Pinneri, Xenia 1998.

Rocco Pinneri is in the board of directors of CIDA- italian astrological association. your name is together Nicholas Campion and Jim Lewis.

margherita

matt23z wrote: The press coverage is all about British casualties, never about Taleban on the run. They seem to be on a Vietnam narrative.

Matt

I picked up a copy of The Daily Star newspaper on the tube today. The editorial criticised the other media for reporting the war like it was Vietnam and went on to mention that 50 Taliban are killed for every British casualty. Clearly the guy was reading Skyscript yesterday and took my hint.

Matt
p.s.
Previously I mentioned the Moon occulting Alcyone.I checked "Babylonian Star-Lore" and it says "If the star cluster goes into the moon the land will rise up against the king. This morning on the radio they mentioned popular protests in Iran,Pakistan and London.

I found it fascinating that the eclipse seemed to co-incide with intense and sudden geomagnetic Its been reported that apparently on July 22, 2009, bright aurora suddenly and surprisingly glowed in the Northern latitudes its been said that its because a crack opened up in the earths magnetic feild allowing the solar wind to pour in ..... Did anyone up North see or hear about this happening Does this happen with every eclipse? or just this long and intense one??? ?? Apparently there were aurora light in the USA as far south as Wisconson.

NRK.no quotes astronomers who reports that August 4th provided the most powerful Solar storm for 25 years. This occurs after a period of great quietness. Paal Brekke at the SOHO project at NASA said that Tuesdays solar storm was the most powerful in modern time. However, in 1859 there was an eruption that doubled the Sun-intensity for a few minutes.


In the wake of this Solar storm there has been observed powerful northern lights in many parts of the world. I missed them, but they apparently gave a magnificent display at 59N, just south of my location. Extreme northern latitudes only have limited periods of darkness at this time of the year. In Tromso at 68N the Sun rises at 3.19 CST and sets at 22.15 and then there is an extended twilight due to the inclination of the equator with the horizon.

And lastly, are Sun storms connected to lunar eclipses? - No.

Source: http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/innenriks/3235123.html

I thought I'd have a look to the circumstances of Bangladesh of the last few weeks.

The first planets that are to aspect the 29?26,5? Cancer point are Mercury - sextile on 25 August, Venus ? conjunct on 26 August (Moon is and square to the point and to Venus 24 August) Mars is in semi-sextile to the eclipse point on 24 August. A weak aspect but worth mentioning because it coincides with the mentioned positions of Mercury Venus and therefore forming square with Mercury and a semi-square with Venus)

Here something of late August on the floodings. http://rezwanul.blogspot.com/2009/08/th ... adesh.html

the eclipse path goes through the northern part of Bangladesh. A just north of Bangladesh and south of Bhutan is the Indian state of Meghalaya. Here is one of the wettest places on Earth to be found, Cherrapunji with an annual precipitation of over 11 metres Since the monsoon period in this part of Asia is from June till November, I believe there could be an more than average rainfall in with perhaps extreme flooding in Bangladesh. Every few years extreme floods threat this area.

And here just a week after the eclipse. http://www.geo.tv/7-29-2009/46737.htm
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Dhak ... 830894.cms

Heaviest rainfall in Dhaka Bangladesh in 53 or 60 years (different news sources but point taken more rain than usual since a long time).

Wednesday an earthquake struck Java http://www.asianews.it/index.php?l=en&art=16219&size=A
geophysical details http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/rec ... 09lbat.php

Here the data for the moment.
Date/Time: 2009.09.02 07:55:01 UTC (GMT - Delta T), JD = 2455076.829873
Sidereal Time: 06:41:25, Delta T = 69.8 seconds
Geocentric positions

Phase of Moon: 0.428 (0.000=New; 0.250=First 1/4; 0.500=Full; 0.750=Last 1/4)

Planet Longitude Latitude Right Asc. Declination
Sun 09 Vir 59'30" 0?00'00" 10:46:06 7?49'21"
Moon 13 Aqr 56'45" 1?16'17" 21:04:08 -15?25'29"
Moon's Node 29 Cap 46'20"R 0?00'00" 20:07:47 -20?11'55"
Apogee 22 Cap 53'17" - 0?37'21" 19:39:17 -22?06'40"
Mercury 05 Lib 06'59" - 3?29'43" 12:13:13 - 5?14'27"
Venus 07 Leo 56'51" 0?06'05" 08:41:34 18?22'45"
Mars 04 Cnc 47'31" 0?12'54" 06:20:55 23?34'03"
Jupiter 19 Aqr 44'12"R - 1?06'02" 21:30:02 -15?56'30"
Saturn 23 Vir 04'42" 1?57'57" 11:37:42 4?33'11"
Uranus 25 Psc 14'02"R - 0?47'54" 23:43:46 - 2?37'36"
Neptune 24 Aqr 39'33"R - 0?25'11" 21:48:23 -13?41'53"
Pluto 00 Cap 40'55"R 5?31'21" 18:02:51 -17?54'55"

The nearest big city Bandung gives angles (for the earthquake moment)
MC = 0?03' Scorpio, Asc. = 28?26' Capricorn.

Now with the 22 july solar eclipse occurring in 29?26'31" Cancer the angles show a significant position. As this takes place every day this wouldn't be so significant but just the day before the Moon was opposite the eclipse point. Furthermore the transiting South Node was just 0?20' off the eclipse point. So (the combination of) Moon and Node appear significant in the earthquake.

Another significant issue is the positions of the angles at Bandung for the moment of the eclipse (or more exact, the moment of the geocentric ecliptical conjunction of Sun and Moon, ie new moon, which is common use for delineation of eclipses).

Bandung angles at eclipse: MC = 26?32' Gemini, Asc. = 25?39' Virgo.

Transiting retrograde Uranus at the eclipse was 0?25' off the Descendant and close to Descendant at the eclipse. At the eclipse Neptune was in a very close (0?07' off) 150? aspect to Ascendant and now still near. Saturn is also still near the Ascendant. Pluto near the stationary point is almost standing still in 0?41' Capricorn and perhaps also plays a role in the recent grand cross discussed in the other thread.

Perhaps a bit far fetched but I suddenly realized that since Indonesia was a Dutch colony until 60 years ago. The (West) Netherlands fall under Cancer and the eclipse was in Cancer too.

The first is that the Sun issues its influence universally and without discrimination. It issues only solar influence and that is the same everywhere:

Possibly interesting physical angle to this is that the Sun itself spins, taking around 27 days to rotate, so in a calender month the solar electromagnetic environment that the earth is immersed in varies in a way that effects the whole globe.

mike c