BATON ROUGE — When the moon passes in front of the sun Monday, its magnitude at Baton Rouge will be about 0.878, meaning that nearly 88 percent of the sun will be blotted out. 

Monday's eclipse will be similar to the one visible from Baton Rouge on March 7, 1970, and greater than the two most-recent major eclipses visible from the city — 80 percent in August 2017 and again last October. It won't be as great as the eclipse on May 30, 1984, which had 98 percent of the sun blocked.

Eclipses are relatively common, as the moon circles the earth once a month, but total eclipses occur about every 18 months or so, somewhere across the globe.

Outside the narrow strip where "totality" occurs, most people see a partial eclipse, and that's all Baton Rouge has seen for more than a century. The next time Baton Rouge is in the path of a total eclipse will be May 11, 2078. For five minutes and two seconds that day, the entire sun will be blotted out.

Here are relatively eclipses seen from Baton Rouge during which at least half of the sun was obscured by the moon:

May 28, 1900: 99 percent

March 7, 1970: 86 percent

Dec. 24, 1973: 51 percent

Feb. 26, 1979: 64 percent

May 30, 1984: 98 percent

July 11, 1991: 59 percent

May 10, 1994: 76 percent

Aug. 21, 2017: 80 percent

Oct. 14, 2023: 80 percent

In five years, on Jan. 14, 2029, an eclipse with 54 percent of the sun masked will occur.