MOSCOW - Visitors flocked to witness a total eclipse of the sun in Siberia on Friday, a surge in tourists that prompted astronomical hotel prices in the remote region, Russian media reported.

The local daily Vecherny Novosibirsk put the number at 15,000 and said it was a local record.

All of Novosibirsk's 2,000 hotel rooms were booked -- the last ones were snapped up months in advance despite being "more expensive than rooms in five-star hotels in Europe," the newspaper said.

Television channels showed people gazing at the eclipse in city parks, some using special visors to prevent eye damage.

Novosibirsk was the largest major city along the path of the total eclipse, which could also be seen in northern Canada, Mongolia and China.

More than 1,000 visitors went to the remote north Siberian town of Nadym, the place where the eclipse lasted the longest, located just below the Arctic Circle, the Interfax news agency reported.

In Moscow small groups of workers gathered on pavements to watch the partial eclipse that was just visible in the capital, obscured by clouds hanging over the city.

Meanwhile the military's Space Force, responsible for military satellites, and the Strategic Rocket Force, responsible for Russia's vast nuclear arsenal, offered reassurance that the eclipse could not disrupt their systems.

"Neither solar or lunar eclipses, nor periodic geomagnetic radiation causing sun spots, affect the working of the control systems of strategic missiles," Alexander Vovk, a spokesman for the strategic missile force told Interfax.

****i wish i could see it or saw it with someone very special it will be so romatic... i wish =)