An eclipse of the sun will be visible across a wide area of the globe including most of Europe, North Africa, the Arabian peninsula and western Asia at 9.05 a.m. tomorrow.

Seen from Malta, 61 per cent of the sun’s diameter will be hidden at a maximum. The landscape will be bathed in subdued sunlight.

“The moon starts to encroach on the sun’s disk at 7.47 a.m. and leaves it at 10.34 a.m.,” a spokesman for the Astronomical Society of Malta, Tony Tanti said.

A solar eclipse happens when the moon crosses the sun from the earth’s viewpoint.

Mr Tanti urged people to avoid looking at the sun without proper eye protection. “Staring at the bright sun can burn your retina, leaving a permanent blind spot in the centre of your vision,” he said.

The safest way to view the eclipse is to watch the sun’s image projected onto a piece of paper by making a small hole in a card with a pencil point and hold a second card a metre or so behind it. The hole will project an inverted image of the sun onto the lower card.