Ronan Keating has shared a reminder of what the number one song was the last time Ireland saw a solar eclipse.
The country — and the continent of Europe as a whole — are set to see a full solar eclipse for the first time in nearly three decades, with eclipse sunglasses selling out everywhere as we prepare to see the moon cover most of the sun on Wednesday evening (August 12).
And while this isn’t a total eclipse in Ireland and England — that honour will fall on Spain and Portugal — this is the closest we’ll get to a total solar eclipse since 1999.
While the world that prepared for the dawn of a new millennium seems so incredibly different from what we’re experiencing nowadays, some might believe that the music was better or worse — case in point, what the number one song was in Ireland and the UK the last time we saw a solar eclipse.
While Notting Hill was released to critical acclaim as a movie, the soundtrack might be viewed as a product of its time; it did, however, give us Ronan Keating’s solo career, which launched with his cover of the song When You Say Nothing At All.
The song shot to number 1 in Ireland and the UK, and sure enough, was the number one song when Europe enjoyed the latest solar eclipse — with Ronan reminding us all of his feat ahead of today’s eclipse.
Sharing a clip of the song’s music video alongside clips of the eclipse, with Ronan captioning the video: ‘Guess which song was number 1 during the 1999 Solar Eclipse?’
The video itself read: ‘it’s like 1999 again, there’s a solar eclipse and you’re listening to Ronan Keating,’ with people reminiscing on the song and their memories of it.
‘I remember that day watching “Notting Hill” at the cinema with my brother and watching the eclipse of the sun afterwards,’ one commented, while another wrote: ‘The number one the day my son was born!’
As for this evening’s eclipse, said to be the deepest in the country until 2090, the west and south are set to have 98% of the sun covered, while in the east and north coverage is expected around 94%.
Some areas of the world are expected to see a total eclipse, including parts of Spain, Greenland and Iceland.
Observatories at Armagh, Dunsink in Dublin, and Blackrock Castle in Cork have organised viewing events, and public events have been planned at Maynooth University in Co Kildare, Queen’s University Belfast and at the Visitor Centre, Phoenix Park in Dublin.
