Fact check: False claim that timelapse photo from South Pole proves Earth is flat

Isabella Fertel, USA TODAY
·5 min read

The claim: Photo of solar eclipse taken at the South Pole proves Earth is flat

The ancient Greeks were able to calculate the Earth's circumference and prove the Earth is a sphere. But not everyone is convinced. One viral Instagram post claims a timelapse photo of a solar eclipse from the South Pole proves otherwise.

"South Pole polar eclipse proves we live on a flat plane," reads text included in the the Nov. 13 Instagram post (direct link, archive link), which features a timelapse photo of a solar eclipse taken in Antarctica.

The sun appears to be moving in a perfectly straight line in the timelapse. The post garnered more than 900 likes in one week.

But the claim is false. Scientists say the timelapse photo is not proof the Earth is flat. The sun appears to be moving in a straight horizontal line due to a multitude of factors including the location of the photo, the time of year and the length of photo exposure.

USA TODAY reached out to the user who shared the post for comment.

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Timelapse not long enough to show sun’s movement

The timelapse photo used in the claim was originally taken by Aman Chokshi, a physics doctoral candidate at the University of Melbourne.

The composite image is made up of multiple exposures taken every four minutes, according to its description on the NASA website. Since there are 33 different exposures, that’s a total of 132 minutes, or a little more than two hours.

Jason Steffen, an associate professor of physics at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, said that’s not enough time to show the sun’s full motion, especially considering when and where the timelapse was taken.

“Near either of the poles, the Sun or Moon will appear to move in a circle at a roughly constant angle above the horizon with only small changes in height throughout a full 24-hour day,” Steffen told USA TODAY in an email. “This set of exposures is only a couple hours in duration, so there won't be much vertical motion in that time.”

Longer timelapse composite images of the same eclipse also taken in Antarctica shows the sun’s vertical positioning in the sky fluctuating slightly throughout the day.

Same eclipse appeared differently at other latitudes

The Earth rotates on a 23.5-degree tilt while orbiting the sun. As a result, different parts of the globe receive different amounts of sunlight at different times of year.

It also means the paths of the sun and moon appear differently at different latitudes.

At the North and South poles, the sun doesn't appear to move up or down much throughout the day. That’s because being at the poles is like being at the center of a rotating top, according to MIT EAPS researcher Rona Oran.

“If you are exactly in the center, you do not ‘move’ from that center,” Oran said in an email. “This would look much different from other latitudes, or anywhere on Earth except at the poles."

Experts say it's also worth noting that the solar eclipse occurred in early December, a few weeks before the winter solstice – which marks the moment when the sun is at its southernmost position relative to the Earth’s equator.

NASA heliophysicist Michael Kirk said the combination of the location and time of year is why the sun appears to be moving in a straight, flat line in the photo.

“Whenever you are poleward from the Arctic or Antarctic Circle, there will be a period of time near the solstice when the Sun never sets – or rises,” Kirk told USA TODAY in an email. “The reason the Sun is appearing to move in a straight line with respect to the horizon is precisely because this is at the South Pole near the solstice.”

Humans theorized the Earth was round more than 2,000 years ago. Since then, scientists have only discovered more evidence to prove this is true – including seeing Earth itself from space.

USA TODAY has debunked an array of false claims about the flat earth theory.

Fact Check: Clouds can appear behind the sun in photos due to optical illusion

Our rating: False

Based on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that this photo of a solar eclipse taken at the South Pole proves Earth is flat. Scientists explained that a variety of factors including the location and time the photographs were taken account for why the sun appears to moving in a straight line.

Our fact-check sources:

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fact check: False claim that timelapse photo is proof of a flat Earth

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