USPS's First Thermochromic Ink stamp

USPS's First Thermochromic Ink stamp

USPS's First Thermochromic Ink stamp was released on June 20th, 2017 to commemorate the August 21st Total Eclipse of the Sun.  The stamp has a black circle in the middle, when it is exposed to light/heat the image of the moon will appear.  Thermochromic inks are vulnerable to UV light and should be kept out of direct sunlight as much as possible to preserve this special effect.  Since the stamps on the cover are traveling a long way, they are exposed to sunlight and obviously they lose their special feature.  In order to preserve the Mint stamps, USPS is providing some special envelopes at an extra cost.

Thanks a lot Arakan, USA for sending these stamps on the cover.

Special Covers - Few aero/space philately related

Recently I started collecting Special Covers mainly on my theme "Flights of Fancy".  Here are some of those...

Below cover was released in 16th of January at Bengaluru during Karnapex 2015.  

Special cover issued for the occasion of Total Solar Eclipse on 16th February 1980.  (You can see the effect of Solar Eclipse: Dull paper color and the inverted stamp :-) )