Experiencing the eclipse
Aug 22, 2017 19:33:20 GMT -5
Post by Wes on Aug 22, 2017 19:33:20 GMT -5
Monday knocked a big item off of my bucket list.
I've seen two different solar eclipses before but both of them were "annular" eclipses, where the moon is far enough away that it doesn't cover the sun. They were pretty spectacular in their own way, but nothing like seeing a total eclipse. I missed my chance at the last North American solar eclipse in 1979, at least partly because Kathy and I were trying to digest a recently purchased house. We would have had a tough time finding the cash to be able to get to a solar eclipse as far away as, say, Toledo, when the best view was far across the country.
So, even nearly forty years ago August 21, 2017 was a date to look forward to. That was far enough in the future that I could hardly believe that I could ever make it that far.
But, when I looked at the calendar early this year I realized that the eclipse would be on a Monday, which is a tough day to take off around here. I knew that it would be especially tough since it would be the Fall Sports Issue, which is timed for the first football game of the year, and there was no getting around it. So, the only way to see the eclipse was to grit our teeth, make as quick a trip as possible, and then come in and try to finish up the paper as quickly as possible.
The closest place to get to the center of totality for us was in either Western Kentucky or Southern Illinois. Knowing that there would be thousands of others with the same goal in mind, we knew that we would have to be creative.
I won't go into the reasoning involved, and the final plan didn't settle out until the last minute. Kathy had a church dinner we had to attend on Sunday, but we left immediately afterward and pointed the nose of the car south, to Terra Haute, Indiana, where we had reserved a motel room. We had understood that I-57 was expected to be crowded and slow, so from Terra Haute we headed south on Illinois SR1, and saw little traffic much of the way. It wasn't until we were just within the path of totality that we decided to press our way on south to Lake Glendale Recreation area, which was only a mile of two off of the centerline.
We got there to discover that the campground was full, but that the beach parking area was open -- and filled with eclipse watchers! I would imagine that there were perhaps a thousand people there, and admittedly, some of them making use of the beach, not a dumb idea on a day with both the temperature and the humidity in the nineties. All in all, totally by chance we picked one of the nicest possible places to see an eclipse.
We had been expecting heavy traffic on the way down there, so we were several hours early.
We wound up parking next to a couple from Wisconsin who were also veteran eclipse watchers, although he was a little more into photography that I was. I decided I'd try to take a few pictures if the opportunity arose, but that I was really more interested in seeing the effects of totality.
Considering the weather, we mostly tried to stay in the shade while we chatted with our new friends and some other passers-by, including the editor of the local weekly paper. We had to compare notes, of course, and discover that some things don't change no matter where you are.
As it got close to first contact, we took occasional glances at the sun, both through the eclipse glasses we had with us -- they were left over from our last eclipse, twenty- three years ago! (Sometimes, being a bit lousy about throwing things out works for you!) However, the view was even better in the Shade 14 welder's glasses that we hauled to their third eclipse.
Finally, we could see first contact, the moment at which the moon first comes over the rim of the sun. Really, at that point it was not much to look at, but we checked every few minutes anyway, to find a little more of the sun covered each time.
By the time the sun was halfway covered by the moon we were beginning to see the changes on the ground. We could perceive the light getting dimmer, and it was almost possible to believe that it was cooling off a bit, although it was hard to tell.
As the sun turned into a bright crescent, you could see the images of it projected on the ground through breaks in the trees that had given us some welcome shade in the earlier hours.
Finally the last hint of the sun slid behind the moon, and you could hear yelling and cries of joy from the many hundreds of people in the park. The shared excitement was one of the hallmarks of the experience.
In the annular eclipses we had been to before, the height of the experience was the "ring around the moon," when the coverage was in the high nineties, so I was really interested in the effect in totality.
It got darker than we had experienced at our earlier eclipses, I would say about the light you would have under about a quarter moon, or perhaps lighter than that. But that wasn't the part that really drew the eye -- it was the solar corona, the hot plasma streaming out from the sun, never visible outside of an eclipse.
Since we were both close to the centerline and the point where the eclipse would be the longest, the experience lasted about two minutes and twenty seconds -- not long enough by any means! The briefness and the rarity are part of the mystique of the experience, and it was this we had waited a third of a century to experience.
I tried to take a few photos during the eclipse but wasn't getting anything worthwhile, so decided this was not the time to diagnose the problem and just put the camera down to enjoy the experience. That may be just as well -- I imagine there will be thousands of photos online in the next few days if there aren't already, and my poor efforts will only show that yes, I really was there.
All too soon was over, but spectacularly as a huge "diamond ring" effect showed in the sky, when the bright light of the sun shown through some lunar valley. While it only last two or three seconds, it was far and away the most vivid part of the eclipse.
We knew we had to hurry to get home so I could get this paper out, so the light was still brightening as we packed up and got on our way, saying goodbye to our new friends. I really hated to leave and would have liked to hang around, but we knew we faced at least a ten hour drive after already having been on the road for four hours that day.
We got out on the road to discover we weren't alone in that idea. The road that had been so empty a few hours before was close to bumper to bumper, but the farther we got the worse it got, until it was finally stop and crawl. It didn't take too much of that before we decided to get off the main road and bushwhack our way out of there on small state and county roads. We found our way into Indiana near the southern tip of the state, made it easily to I-69 and headed north in not objectionable traffic.
It was still eleven hours to get home since we ran into several construction delays along the way, but we pulled in at 1:30 in the morning and were in bed shortly thereafter.
So, we drove just over a thousand miles in 36 hours to watch two minutes and twenty seconds of eclipse. Was it worth it? You bet!
I've seen two different solar eclipses before but both of them were "annular" eclipses, where the moon is far enough away that it doesn't cover the sun. They were pretty spectacular in their own way, but nothing like seeing a total eclipse. I missed my chance at the last North American solar eclipse in 1979, at least partly because Kathy and I were trying to digest a recently purchased house. We would have had a tough time finding the cash to be able to get to a solar eclipse as far away as, say, Toledo, when the best view was far across the country.
So, even nearly forty years ago August 21, 2017 was a date to look forward to. That was far enough in the future that I could hardly believe that I could ever make it that far.
But, when I looked at the calendar early this year I realized that the eclipse would be on a Monday, which is a tough day to take off around here. I knew that it would be especially tough since it would be the Fall Sports Issue, which is timed for the first football game of the year, and there was no getting around it. So, the only way to see the eclipse was to grit our teeth, make as quick a trip as possible, and then come in and try to finish up the paper as quickly as possible.
The closest place to get to the center of totality for us was in either Western Kentucky or Southern Illinois. Knowing that there would be thousands of others with the same goal in mind, we knew that we would have to be creative.
I won't go into the reasoning involved, and the final plan didn't settle out until the last minute. Kathy had a church dinner we had to attend on Sunday, but we left immediately afterward and pointed the nose of the car south, to Terra Haute, Indiana, where we had reserved a motel room. We had understood that I-57 was expected to be crowded and slow, so from Terra Haute we headed south on Illinois SR1, and saw little traffic much of the way. It wasn't until we were just within the path of totality that we decided to press our way on south to Lake Glendale Recreation area, which was only a mile of two off of the centerline.
We got there to discover that the campground was full, but that the beach parking area was open -- and filled with eclipse watchers! I would imagine that there were perhaps a thousand people there, and admittedly, some of them making use of the beach, not a dumb idea on a day with both the temperature and the humidity in the nineties. All in all, totally by chance we picked one of the nicest possible places to see an eclipse.
We had been expecting heavy traffic on the way down there, so we were several hours early.
We wound up parking next to a couple from Wisconsin who were also veteran eclipse watchers, although he was a little more into photography that I was. I decided I'd try to take a few pictures if the opportunity arose, but that I was really more interested in seeing the effects of totality.
Considering the weather, we mostly tried to stay in the shade while we chatted with our new friends and some other passers-by, including the editor of the local weekly paper. We had to compare notes, of course, and discover that some things don't change no matter where you are.
As it got close to first contact, we took occasional glances at the sun, both through the eclipse glasses we had with us -- they were left over from our last eclipse, twenty- three years ago! (Sometimes, being a bit lousy about throwing things out works for you!) However, the view was even better in the Shade 14 welder's glasses that we hauled to their third eclipse.
Finally, we could see first contact, the moment at which the moon first comes over the rim of the sun. Really, at that point it was not much to look at, but we checked every few minutes anyway, to find a little more of the sun covered each time.
By the time the sun was halfway covered by the moon we were beginning to see the changes on the ground. We could perceive the light getting dimmer, and it was almost possible to believe that it was cooling off a bit, although it was hard to tell.
As the sun turned into a bright crescent, you could see the images of it projected on the ground through breaks in the trees that had given us some welcome shade in the earlier hours.
Finally the last hint of the sun slid behind the moon, and you could hear yelling and cries of joy from the many hundreds of people in the park. The shared excitement was one of the hallmarks of the experience.
In the annular eclipses we had been to before, the height of the experience was the "ring around the moon," when the coverage was in the high nineties, so I was really interested in the effect in totality.
It got darker than we had experienced at our earlier eclipses, I would say about the light you would have under about a quarter moon, or perhaps lighter than that. But that wasn't the part that really drew the eye -- it was the solar corona, the hot plasma streaming out from the sun, never visible outside of an eclipse.
Since we were both close to the centerline and the point where the eclipse would be the longest, the experience lasted about two minutes and twenty seconds -- not long enough by any means! The briefness and the rarity are part of the mystique of the experience, and it was this we had waited a third of a century to experience.
I tried to take a few photos during the eclipse but wasn't getting anything worthwhile, so decided this was not the time to diagnose the problem and just put the camera down to enjoy the experience. That may be just as well -- I imagine there will be thousands of photos online in the next few days if there aren't already, and my poor efforts will only show that yes, I really was there.
All too soon was over, but spectacularly as a huge "diamond ring" effect showed in the sky, when the bright light of the sun shown through some lunar valley. While it only last two or three seconds, it was far and away the most vivid part of the eclipse.
We knew we had to hurry to get home so I could get this paper out, so the light was still brightening as we packed up and got on our way, saying goodbye to our new friends. I really hated to leave and would have liked to hang around, but we knew we faced at least a ten hour drive after already having been on the road for four hours that day.
We got out on the road to discover we weren't alone in that idea. The road that had been so empty a few hours before was close to bumper to bumper, but the farther we got the worse it got, until it was finally stop and crawl. It didn't take too much of that before we decided to get off the main road and bushwhack our way out of there on small state and county roads. We found our way into Indiana near the southern tip of the state, made it easily to I-69 and headed north in not objectionable traffic.
It was still eleven hours to get home since we ran into several construction delays along the way, but we pulled in at 1:30 in the morning and were in bed shortly thereafter.
So, we drove just over a thousand miles in 36 hours to watch two minutes and twenty seconds of eclipse. Was it worth it? You bet!