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Merged Solar Eclipse 2017!

Every day I pause and look at the moon dial on my grandfather clock. I contemplate all the elements of time, space, and matter that are conspiring toward the eclipse. I think of the mechanics of the clock that have been designed with precision to track the time. Our astronomical knowledge of the sun, the moon, the stars. That vastness and incredible energy of the universe. All the people throughout history who have witnessed such an event, and all those who have not. The incredible circumstance of human awareness that allows us to understand and witness this event. I feel so powerless, and so powerful. It is rather overwhelming. And beautiful.

Life is amazing!
 
Trebuchet said:
That is indeed rather humorous. I also bought the other ones.

We've had reservations in Portland for months, with the intention of driving south first thing in the morning. I've become sufficiently terrified of the probable traffic that we may just stay in Portland and watch it partial.
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Partial's not worth the drive to Portland. It looks like the Sun with a rounded cloud in front it. Just leave at 4 in the morning, few people will be that dedicated leaving Portland.
 
I'm in the northeast, but my wife and I decided to go west instead of south. We chose Lincoln Nebraska as the best compromise between distance and the weather probabilities. We made our hotel reservations there back in January. We're traveling by road with some younger relatives so we reserved a suite to stay in (most likely, the regular rooms were already booked by then anyhow).

Lincoln is just inside the 1-minute-of-totality path. On the day-of we can go south to Beatrice (or the Homestead Monument, which is a NASA broadcast location too), or west toward Grand Island or Broken Bow, or way west to the Nebraska Sand Hills if we're feeling adventurous, or improvise. All depending, of course, on the traffic and weather.
 
Cool. I have relatives in Beatrice and one of my great-great-grandmothers was a founder of the town.

Meanwhile, I'm becoming sufficiently paranoid about traffic in Oregon that I'm getting fairly certain we'll just watch the partial from Portland.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Partial's not worth the drive to Portland. It looks like the Sun with a rounded cloud in front it....
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I would not poo-poo on Portland's eclipse. According to NASA's interactive map, at least 99.4% of the sun will be blocked at its maximum there.

Back in 1994, 94% of the sun got blocked during an annular eclipse I witnessed here in Chicago. While it was a bright sunny day, the actual light level at maximum eclipse was so low that the street lights in my neighborhood switched on.

This is what a Chicago Tribune article about the event had to say:

"Peered at through special eclipse-watching glasses, pinhole cameras, welder's helmets or sundry other devices people used-sometimes against ophthalmological advice-the result was a sun that appeared as a moonlike crescent with a dark round shadow in front.

"The lakefront temperature, at noon, had plunged 8 degrees in an hour, to 52 Fahrenheit. Animals were fooled into thinking it was night, and so were less canny creatures: On Upper Wacker Drive, streetlights equipped with light sensors began to glow.

"It was not close to dark-even 6 percent of the sun gives off 1,000 times the light of a full moon, Adler Planetarium scientists said-but it was eerie."
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So while it's not a total eclipse, I would be very curious of what it would be like when there is BARELY any sun left exposed by the moon.
 
Myriad said:
I bought a pair of their 10 x 25 solar binoculars a couple weeks ago. I've been looking at the sun with them (on those rare recent occasions when the sun has actually been visible from my locale) and they work great. Anything silhouetted by the sun's disk, such as tree branches (or, hopefully, the moon!), is also visible through the binoculars crystal clear. In silhouette only, of course.

What I don't understand is why they also sell a 10 x 42 version of the solar binoculars. They're the same magnification (10) but a larger aperture (42 mm instead if 25). Why??!!?!?!!? That means the objective lenses gather more light, which is just what you need if you're trying to see something dim or at high magnification, but the sun is about the least dim thing you can look at (unless you're working with high-power lasers) and the magnification is the same. So in this case it just means the image has to be filtered more to compensate. So you can have bigger, heavier, more expensive binoculars that are not better in any way I can imagine.

All I can think of is that they expect users, after the eclipse, to dismantle the binoculars and remove the solar filters, and with the 10 x 42 you'd end up with a better pair for low-light viewing.
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In theory the larger objective is capable of higher resolution. But I doubt this would be noticeable with 10x magnification and hand held optics. Higher resolution also requires good seeing conditions which are unlikely to happen in the middle of the day.

I made the same decision and got the cheaper 10x25 model. My local Best Buy had them along with some other Celestron eclipse products in stock.
 
Myriad said:
I'm in the northeast, but my wife and I decided to go west instead of south. We chose Lincoln Nebraska as the best compromise between distance and the weather probabilities. We made our hotel reservations there back in January. We're traveling by road with some younger relatives so we reserved a suite to stay in (most likely, the regular rooms were already booked by then anyhow).

Lincoln is just inside the 1-minute-of-totality path. On the day-of we can go south to Beatrice (or the Homestead Monument, which is a NASA broadcast location too), or west toward Grand Island or Broken Bow, or way west to the Nebraska Sand Hills if we're feeling adventurous, or improvise. All depending, of course, on the traffic and weather.
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My current plan is to watch from western Nebraska in the vast empty spaces north of Scotts Bluff. This will avoid the mob from Denver taking I25 north into Wyoming.

Watching the eclipse from CarhengeWP would be awesome, but it might not be in the path of totality.
 
My wife and in-laws will be flying out of Toronto at almost exactly the time of the local maximum (75% coverage).
 
Kestrel said:
My current plan is to watch from western Nebraska in the vast empty spaces north of Scotts Bluff. This will avoid the mob from Denver taking I25 north into Wyoming.

Watching the eclipse from CarhengeWP would be awesome, but it might not be in the path of totality.
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Carhenge is definitely in the path, only a few miles from the center line.

If you are going north of Scottsbluff, on 71 the center line is just before the road turns East, and on 29 it is just south of Agate Fossil Beds. So the center line is about 15-20 miles from the edge of town.
 
carlvs said:
I would not poo-poo on Portland's eclipse. According to NASA's interactive map, at least 99.4% of the sun will be blocked at its maximum there.

Back in 1994, 94% of the sun got blocked during an annular eclipse I witnessed here in Chicago. While it was a bright sunny day, the actual light level at maximum eclipse was so low that the street lights in my neighborhood switched on.

This is what a Chicago Tribune article about the event had to say:

So while it's not a total eclipse, I would be very curious of what it would be like when there is BARELY any sun left exposed by the moon.
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I've seen a partial eclipse, I'm speaking from experience as well.
 
Weather for Knoxville/ Smoky Mountains looking just "okay"

Have to pick a spot in the park

I'll be over left near the green blotch

TSE2017_state_map_NorthCarolina.jpg

https://www.greatamericaneclipse.com/north-carolina/
 
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The weather forecast for Salem Oregon is holding steady at partly cloudy; I feel good. Final decision on the 4 hour drive from WA will be made Sunday evening.
 
Dumb All Over said:
With one week to go, how is everyone feeling about the weather prospects from your viewing area?
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So far there's nothing indicating I've made the wrong decision by planning to go west (a greater distance) instead of south. However, I take long-range weather forecasts with a supercell-sized grain of salt. In two or three more days, I'll start closely watching the trends in those forecasts, to see whether and how I'll have to improvise.
 
Myriad you can't call Thunderstorms and that's not the kind of cloud cover to worry about

That early in the day ....thermal activity has not ramped up heavily

the further west you go the earlier the eclipse and the less chance of over development.

This is not the kind of weather pattern that allows pinpoint forecasting.
 
So it seems Eastern Tennessee / Western North Carolina is going to be a madhouse.

Do we have any locals here that can offer up a tip on where to see this? I saw that Townshend TN isn't too far from Gatlinburgh so that was our plan A. Plan B was Sweetwater.

The roads in and around Smokey Mountain National Park are going to either be closed or bumper to bumper. That's right out until after the Eclipse. We'll visit the Smokies on Wednesday and Thursday....
 
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