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The new moon crosses in front of the sun creating an annular eclipse over West Mitten, left, and East Mitten buttes Sunday, May 20, 2012, in Monument Valley, Ariz.

Julie Jacobson, Associated Press

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The moon slides across the sun, showing a blazing halo of light, during an annular solar eclipse at a waterfront park in Yokohama, near Tokyo, on Monday, May 21, 2012. Millions of Asians watched as a rare "ring of fire" eclipse crossed their skies early Monday. The annular eclipse, in which the moon passes in front of the sun leaving only a golden ring around its edges, was visible to wide areas across the continent.

Shuji Kajiyama, Associated Press

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People throughout Utah are in for a rare celestial treat this weekend.

An annular eclipse is set to traverse Central and Southern Utah on Saturday morning, but the entire state — including Ogden — will be able to view it at least partially, pending clear weather.

John Armstrong, professor fo physics and astronomy at Weber State University, told the Standard-Examiner that Saturday’s event differs a bit from the total eclipse that crossed the United States in 2017.

“An annular eclipse occurs when the moon passes in front of the sun,” he said. “But because the moon is on a slightly non-circular orbit, sometimes it’s further away from us and sometimes it’s closer. If it’s further away from us like it is right now, it’s a little bit smaller, so it doesn’t quite cover the entire disk of the sun. In a regular (total) solar eclipse, the entire sun is blocked out. In an annular eclipse, you get something known as the ‘ring of fire,’ which is a very thin ring of light that will be peeking around the shadow of the moon.”

He said the nature of the moon’s orbit makes this a decently rare event.

“If you were to draw a line between the earth, the moon and the sun during a new moon, in principle, those should line up every month because we have a new moon every month and that’s when the moon is in the direction of the sun,” he said. “But the orbit of the moon is slightly tilted. As it processes around in this tilted orbit, it only lines up with the sun maybe once or twice per year — which is still pretty frequent, but it’s not once per month.”

And even this frequency doesn’t mean it will pop up in an ideal place for viewing.

“What makes it special is, most of the time, those eclipses occur over the ocean or over Antarctica or someplace where it’s really cloudy,” he said. “The fact that it’s cutting straight through the state of Utah — certainly for those of us who live here — it’s going to be a pretty easy thing to see.”

This year’s annular eclipse will cut a path of totality stretching from Oregon to Texas. In Utah, the path of totality will pass over cities such as Delta and Richfield, entering the state in west-central Utah and moving toward the southeast corner . The National Parks Service notes that several properties including Bryce Canyon, Glen Canyon, Grand Staircase Escalante, Bears Ears, Canyonlands, Natural Bridges and Rainbow Bridge will be in the path of the eclipse. The eclipse will begin in Utah around 9:08 a.m. with annular totality at 10:28 a.m. and a finish around noon.

Pending clear weather, Armstrong said the Ogden area will see about 90% of the sun being covered.

“We won’t see the ‘ring of fire’ because we’re out of what’s called the path of totality,” he said. “If you want to see that, though, you’re going to have to have some solar eclipse glasses.”

However, he said that not all viewings require looking up at the sky.

“If you can find a tree with dappled shade underneath it, those criss-crossing leaves form little ‘pinhole cameras’ and you’ll actually see images of the annular eclipse on the ground,” he said. “You can watch the eclipse safely by just watching under the leaves of trees and you’ll get a few dozen or few hundred images of what’s happening in the sky.”

He said it’s an event that people don’t want to miss.

“The solar eclipses are some of the most unique astronomical events that you can see,” he said. “We can predict them really far out into the future. It’s going to be otherworldly — the light’s going to start to dim. It’ll be midday but it’ll seem like dusk. It should be a really fun and interesting experience.”

However, it’s not the only eclipse event on the horizon for the United States. The country will witness another total eclipse on April 8, 2024, with the path of totality stretching from Texas to Maine.