Merged Solar Eclipse 2017!

[JayUtah]

I guess I busted then.

Apologies if I seemed to trivialize your experience. That was not my intent. Especially if you've never seen any solar eclipse at all, a partial eclipse can still be exciting, especially if you have even modest suitable optics. For example, if you mentally compensate for atmospheric distortion, you can see through even a hobbyist telescope that the edge of the Moon has distinct contour detail. It's not a perfect arc. You can see mountain ranges on the edge of the disk, in silhouette.

Also, since there was some magnetic activity that day, there were complexes of sunspots that could be fixed references to timing the Moon's orbital motion.

There are also the tricks you can play with shadows, casting shadows with colanders and other items. Those are even better during an annular eclipse, which never achieves totality although the Moon is squarely lined up between Earth and Sun. Where we were, a hale of laughter went up when people's automatic car headlights turned themselves on at a certain degree of darkness.

As Dr. Phil Plait said, tens of millions of people were astronomers for a day, no matter where on the path (or off it) they were. That's got to count for something, and some of that fascination will stick for a few people.

First off, I'll agree with the other posters here. Totality or bust.

What I and others mean by this is that seeing the totality is a fundamentally different experience. And seeing it live is a fundamentally different than seeing it on a screen. Totality is not just "a whole lot darker." It's a complete change in what you see around you. And it's not just the Sun winking out and being replaced by the familiar disk-and-corona display. It's the fact that it's happening live, in the sky, to a familiar object. There's a visceral reaction. No matter how intellectually expected the event, the experience of "Holy Bleep, the Sun went dark!" strikes a primal chord.

I was at North Menan Butte where I could see all the way past the edge of totality almost 360 degrees all the way around.

Nice country; I used to fish in the Driggs area until the rest of the planet discovered it.

Oh, and it took me 9 hours to get back to my SLC hotel.

I assume you went down I-15. I heard similar reports from other people who drove either to that area or to the Boise area where I went. From on high, it looked like I-84/86 was at a standstill in places. Luckily we were smart enough not to try to land at SLC international, which was fairly choked with light aircraft in addition to normal comair.

Totally worth it though.

Agreed. You can see why a few people become eclipse afficionados and travel the globe to see these things. I haven't yet run into a single person who expended effort to see this event, to whatever degree, who regrets that effort.

 

[RussDill]

I assume you went down I-15. I heard similar reports from other people who drove either to that area or to the Boise area where I went. From on high, it looked like I-84/86 was at a standstill in places. Luckily we were smart enough not to try to land at SLC international, which was fairly choked with light aircraft in addition to normal comair.

Yup, the I-15. Fortunately eclipses truly bring out the best people. Everyone was calm about it and at many points people got out, walked around, talked, handed out water, etc.

 

[JayUtah]

Yup, the I-15. Fortunately eclipses truly bring out the best people. Everyone was calm about it and at many points people got out, walked around, talked, handed out water, etc.

You could have done the opening scene from La La Land.

 

[RussDill]

You could have done the opening scene from La La Land.

I did follow someone almost all the way to LA who had the CA license plate, "AUG 21". Now that's dedication.

 

[Dumb All Over]

What did we see?

I believe I misread the location described in your original post. Would you categorize the object as being close to the horizon?

 

[RussDill]

During totality we only saw one “star”. I said it was probably Venus, but I wasn’t sure. Looking at maps, Venus doesn’t fit the position. The “star” we saw was to the lower right of the sun/moon. The maps I’ve seen suggest that it was Sirius. But they also suggest that Sirius would be less bright than Venus. So I’m still not sure what we saw. It was pretty far away from the sun/moon toward the lower left about a 45 degree angle. I think. I was a bit stunned and slack-jawed, so I can’t guarantee my memories are precise.

I was able to see Regulus with a spotting scope, which just blew me away.

 

[Pooneil]

There's a visceral reaction. No matter how intellectually expected the event, the experience of "Holy Bleep, the Sun went dark!" strikes a primal chord.

I was near Lake City Kentucky on the edge of Lake Barkley. It was a singular experience. Like nothing else. Orders of magnitude better than the partials I've seen in the past. Were already getting ready to be on top of Enchanted Rock, in Texas, for the 2024 eclipse.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

I was able to see Regulus with a spotting scope, which just blew me away.

[qimg]http://scliving.coop/downloads/2981/download/August-2017-eclipse-star-chart-terry-richardson.png[/qimg]

Based on that picture, what I saw was Venus.

ETA: Wait. When I go here that second picture (the first one with the round circle) it would be Sirius.

I was in Missouri. The star/planet was about halfway between the horizon and the sun, off to the right of the sun. I think. I was a bit stunned and can't remember exactly where it was, but it was somewhere around there.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Based on that picture, what I saw was Venus.

With my binoculars, I saw Jupiter. Couldn't really see any other stars or planets but then I didn't look very long; got to enjoy those 2 minutes of totality, you can see the rest at other times.

 

[sarge]

With my binoculars, I saw Jupiter. Couldn't really see any other stars or planets but then I didn't look very long; got to enjoy those 2 minutes of totality, you can see the rest at other times.

No Venus? It should have been clearly and easily visible if Jupiter was. I had totality and Venus was obvious even to the naked eye.

 

[Dr. Keith]

Were already getting ready to be on top of Enchanted Rock, in Texas, for the 2024 eclipse.

Excellent choice! You may have to arrive and camp out for a bit just to get a spot. I know they have to close the gates on popular weekends when they hit capacity.

I'm making plans to be nearby.

 

[Myriad]

Belated eclipse report, due to a lightning strike that took out a certain hotel's WiFi access a week ago.

Six of us took the two-day drive to Lincoln, Nebraska. Traffic and crowding were not issues because we started the drive three days early (to arrive a day and a half before the eclipse) and also because apparently that was a West Coast thing, which the media pretended was nationwide.

One of our party, due to a flare-up of a long term ongoing medical issue, ended up visiting the local ER the night before the eclipse. He was okay with some medication (and remains okay as of this writing), but concern for his condition and possible future needs made any further long-distance travel on eclipse day out of the question. In any case, the forecast weather conditions (partly to mostly cloudy) were no better farther south (closer to the max totality path) or west or southeast for any feasible distance. So we ended up watching the eclipse from Taylor Park, a small neighborhood park in east Lincoln, among a scattering of a few dozen friendly residents who were oddly but genuinely appreciative that we'd traveled 1,300 miles to visit the picnic spot adjacent to their backyards.

The early stages of the eclipse had clear sky, but clouds were moving in as per the forecast. Thin high clouds had little effect (the eclipse glasses seemed to have the effect of filtering out the cloudiness). About 40 minutes before totality, thicker clouds moved in that at their worst completely obscured the solar disk. But shortly before totality, much thinner clouds passed over and we had a great view of the final crescent.

Due to the forecast we had resigned ourselves that we probably wouldn't get to see the coronal phenomena during totality. I thought the corona was comparable to stars in brightness, so that even thin clouds would make it invisible. I was wrong! Totality came and the corona was bright and clear, at least to the naked eye. The high cloud did seem to add or enhance some colors, though. It was, as others have reported, quite spectacular.

I had resolved not to attempt to photograph the totality; it would waste time, and lots of people with lots of equipment would be taking much better photos than I could. With only one minute and 14 seconds of totality where we were, this was even more important. Yet after the first sight I ended up fiddling with camera settings for a good 10 seconds before remembering that resolution and putting the damn camera down.

Others in the area had anything from complete cloud cover to completely clear patches during totality, depending on their exact locations and blind luck. The major viewing area/event that we originally planned to go to, in and around the Homestead National Monument and the town of Beatrice right on the max path (2:34 of totality), had similar conditions to ours: thick clouds at times, but only a high thin layer during totality that didn't significantly obscure the view.

Yesterday morning, our stop-over hotel in Indianapolis lost water pressure, so half our group had no showers. The other half, the ailing individual and his wife and nephew, had already caught a 6AM flight the rest of the way home, for the sake of his health and comfort. The rest of us got home last night, on schedule.

No regrets.

 

[Arisia]

Oh bad traffic happened in other places, too. My sister was able to watch 100% totality from her backyard in eastern Tennessee, and she said she was so glad that she didn't have to deal with the parking lot that was I-75.

Please, everyone, in 2024 stick to the large cities and leave the rural areas in northern New England alone.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

No Venus? It should have been clearly and easily visible if Jupiter was. I had totality and Venus was obvious even to the naked eye.

Not sure why but I suspect there was just enough haze in the air so it didn't affect the eclipse but it did affect the background sky. There were nearby fires.

BTW, I am so totally jealous of your experience.

 

[Arisia]

Hey, anyone live in the area of the crossing zone of the 2017 and 2024 100% totality lines? That would be cool!

ETA: Southern Illinois, meaning south of Carbondale, from the looks of it. With nearby bits of Missouri and Kentucky as well.

 

[Delvo]

My plan was to be in the border area of North Carolina and Tennessee on Saturday morning (which meant leaving Pennsylvania on Friday) and drive around looking for a good place to stop and wait. I was prepared to camp out in either my tent or my car, which, being a PT Cruiser, is like a metal & glass tent when I take the back seats out. (I've even made a long white cloth thing to hang in the windows like a curtain for sleeping and changing clothes in there. That thing comes back into this story later.) I figured that the places where people normally gather outside would be overrun so I'd need to find an unconventional place, like the top of one of those hills you sometimes see from the highway while driving by (especially the cut-away rock-faced ones), which people don't normally climb because there's no road or trail leading to them or parking lot near them. I marked the eclipse path on my road atlas and noting a road through adjacent National Forests in TN and NC, called the "Cherohala Scenic Skyway", and decided to start by driving along that on Saturday and stop wherever there seemed to be a possible candidate site.

The third or fourth stop was perfect: a trailhead in the Nantahala National Forest in NC with a parking lot that could hold about eight vehicles, leading to a hiking trail which connects with two treeless hilltops, among the tallest in the area (the lower one being at 5440 feet). The location was perfect, not only because of the view it offered of both the landscape and the sky, but also because it was fairly well protected from overcrowding; it was not only far from any town along a curvy slopey two-lane road, but also just not possible for too many people to park too close to. Once that tiny parking lot was full, people started parking along the side of the road wherever they could fit, and using a wider grassy spot down the hill from the parking lot, but there was only so much of even that kind of shenanigans that could really be done.

So the crowd on my hill never got out of hand. We got just enough for the next couple of days to be like an outdoor festival. People were meeting our tent-neighbors, including a few kids of all ages and several dogs, and talking & throwing frisbees & playing guitars (or other guitar-like instruments) & playing games & sharing supplies, but the tents were far enough apart that you could also sit alone and read for a while with the rest of the noise just fading into the background. At night there were a few big fires that people from several tents around would gather around, and when those went out, some of us would sit/lay outside for a while with no light but stars (LOTS of them) and the Milky Way. I met one guy who brought a reflecting telescope and was showing people the planets & moons & galaxies, and another who brought a drone and got video of our camp from above & all around.

Eclipse day, which had been predicted to be sunny or mostly sunny, started mostly cloudy. There was a break in the clouds right at C1 so we could clearly see that the eclipse had begun, but that was brief, and then we had nothing but clouds above for about another 20 minutes. I know one couple who gave up and left. Then the clouds fizzled away by the time the moon had gotten about 40% of the way across the sun, and stayed gone for the rest of the eclipse. The temperature had started going down by then, and the curtain-cloth was damp by the end, so I suspect that the eclipse killed the clouds by making them come down.

One thing I was planning to watch for was a shadow phenomenon just before & after totality called "shadow lines" or "shadow snakes", which would look like the ground was covered in snakes all slithering in parallel with each other for just about 30 seconds. It's most easily seen in a smooth, light-colored surface, so I brought the Cruiser's curtain-cloth so I could roll it out on the ground when the time came. Most other people there hadn't heard of it til I told them, but after I told them, the word spread, and others started trying to think of what else they had on-site that could serve the same purpose as my curtain-cloth, so by the time it happened we had several groups of people around the camp ready for it. When the shadow lines appeared, I heard not only the people right around me reacting, but also others I'd met before from a few dozen yards away, shouting "Hey Derek, we got snakes!". Afterward, several people told me that was one of the best parts of the event and thanked me for either telling everyone about it or letting everyone nearby share my curtain-cloth or both.

On the actual eclipse itself, I've heard of people being disappointed with it, but only from people who got a partial eclipse, not the total eclipse. The difference is immense, and it happens suddenly. It's like a whole other world just slams down on you and all around you all at once: a world where the sky is dark above with stars and a black disk surrounded by glowing smoke, but the bottom of the sky all the way around is entirely in flames. And on this hill, you'd be sharing that with about a hundred of your closest eclipse buddies as the last event in the weekend eclipse festival.

 

[Dumb All Over]

Shadow snakes? What the...? How come I have never heard of shadow snakes before? I want to see shadow snakes!

After reading your post, Delvo, I found several videos of shadow snakes. Here is but one example:


Those are cool. What causes them?

Nice post, Delvo. I'm glad to hear the clouds cooperated on your viewing hill.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Never heard of shadow snakes either. Wish I'd have known so I could have looked for them.

Scientists are unsure what causes it, but it is the same phenomenon that causes stars to twinkle,...

Well, then it is the interference of the atmosphere with the light, right?

 

[Dumb All Over]

Well, then it is the interference of the atmosphere with the light, right?

If it is the same thing that makes stars twinkle, then, yes.

 

[Dumb All Over]

On further thought, stars twinkle because their light emanates from a single point, whereas planets don't because the light is coming from a much closer, and therefore larger, object. I'm perplexed.

ETA: All of the above interacting with the atmosphere to a greater or lesser extent, of course.