From the wastes of Siberia to the deserts of western China, thousands of people turned out to watch the solar eclipse as it swept across the earth.

The eclipse began in arctic Canada, when the moon first came between the earth and the sun. The shadow then passed across northern Greenland to Russia, where soon after 1000 GMT yesterday darkness descended on the Siberian city of Novosibirsk. Birds fell silent and the temperature dropped suddenly. An eerie wind blew through the assembled throng.

It was the largest city under the eclipse path and more than 10,000 tourists descended on the city, local media reported, booking out hotels months in advance.

In St Petersburg the sun's outer corona appeared, to gasps of amazement from onlookers. "You just feel part of nature," said one. "This is so rare".

The Kremlin's top medical adviser, Gennady Onishchenko, told Russian TV: "It is quite eerie for any thinking person to watch how everything turns into darkness in broad daylight."

Scores of tourists from around the world have travelled to remote settlements in Russia and China the event, many of them veteran eclipse-chasers. “I’ve come all the way from California for this. It’s going to be my 11th eclipse, I try to see them all,” said Dave Balch, a cancer care adviser.

In Khotan, in Xinjiang in northwestern China, observers turned out to watch the partial eclipse, while others stayed indoors to watch a broadcast of totality from a few hundred miles down the road, transmitted live on Chinese TV.

It was difficult to be sure when the eclipse had begun, until one local workman had the idea of looking at the sun through the thick smoked glass of his welding mask, and the lip of the moon was obvious over the edge of the sun.

The ancient Chinese believed that a solar eclipse was caused by a dragon or dog swallowing the sun - and the modern Mandarin word for the phenomenon, rishi, is made up of the characters for “sun” and “eat”. Few still believe that, but many in this remote town felt that something very strange was happening.

It could be good or it could be bad – it depends on the interpretation," said Mr Liu, who was selling inflatable penguins beneath a statue of Chairman Mao. "I read a book about it once, but I forgot it all.”

Others were certain the eclipse would a harbinger of misfortune. “This kind of thing means trouble,” said the woman in the soft drink stall. “It’s difficult to explain but it’s very abnormal when something happens so suddenly like this.”

“It’s not bad luck, so much as uncertainty,” she said. “How can it be good, when the sun disappears? You don’t know what it means, and I don’t know what it means. But the Heavens know.”

In Britain, low cloud blotted out the eclipse across much of the country, but in Shetland, where 36 per cent of the sun was covered - more than anywhere else in Britain - the sky remained miraculously clear.

Local astronomers were delighted, but many remained oblivious to the optical delight that was unfolding above them. There were no crowds out watching - just the odd telescope on cliff tops or in people’s gardens.

“I didn’t even realise there was an eclipse,” said the receptionist at a local hotel. “It just goes to show what happens if you live up here - you don’t find out about anything until it’s too late.”

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