What is it called when light from the sun is cut off?

Answer 1

Night!

Or an eclipse.

Answer 2

When light from the sun is cut off, it is called a solar eclipse. This occurs when the moon passes between the sun and Earth, blocking the sunlight. There are different types of solar eclipses, including total, partial, and annular eclipses, depending on the alignment of the sun, moon, and Earth.

Answer 3

Assuming that you mean: "cut off permanently", the answer is: it depends. Two things would happen immediately: photosynthesis by plants would stop, pulling the rug from under the world's food production, and temperatures would start to drop. Since with the light, also the heat of the Sun would disappear, in a matter of a week temperatures would be around zero degrees Fahrenheit (minus 20 Celsius) and it would already be a very cold winter outside. Two months later it would be minus 17 F (= -27 C) and after 4 months it would be like the South Pole at the depth of winter all over the planet . That means that most of the world's population living in uninsulated houses in the Third World or elsewhere in the (sub)tropics would already have died from the cold in about a month if not already earlier from lack of food. The same would probably go for better-protected Westerners: most people in the 'civilized' world would find their food shops completely emptied in a matter of one week or so, and their heating would break down (if they then still lived) withing two to four months.

Within a year temperatures would be - 100 F (= - 73 C) . Only a tiny group of humans with access to extremely well-insulated shelters, heating that would still work (like geothermal forms of heating) and plenty of tins of food in the cupboard might still survive. Also within a few months the oceans would have frozen over, although under the ice the water would remain fluid . The Earth's temperature would finally stabilize at - 400 degrees Fahrenheit, some - 250 degrees Celcius.

So survival would be a matter of a few weeks or at the very best a few months for most of us. Most non-polar animals would also be dead as would most of the Earth's plant life and crops. Only some hardy deep sea-fish species and a few equally hardy and self-supporting forms of plant life might survive for a few centuries.

Answer 4

Oh, dude, that's a total eclipse! It's like when the moon photobombs the sun and steals its spotlight for a bit. It's all about celestial bodies playing hide and seek in the sky.