Today’s the big day! For the first time since August 2017, parts of North America are getting a total solar eclipse. Depending on where you are on the continent, you’ll get to see the sun, moon, and Earth line up to varying degrees, with the luckiest people seeing it at its totality along a path that runs from Dallas, TX to Little Rock, AR to Cleveland, OH, Buffalo, NY, and Caribou, ME. The total path stretches about 115 miles across the continent. Here are the major cities and the local time for total eclipse:
Dallas, Texas: 1:40-1:44 p.m. CDT
Idabel, Oklahoma: 1:45-1:49 p.m. CDT
Little Rock, Arkansas: 1:51-1:54 p.m. CDT
Poplar Bluff, Missouri: 1:56-2:00 p.m. CDT
Paducah, Kentucky: 2-2:02 p.m. CDT
Carbondale, Illinois: 1:59-2:03 p.m. CDT
Evansville, Indiana: 2:02-2:05 p.m. CDT
Cleveland, Ohio: 3:13-3:17 p.m. EDT
Erie, Pennsylvania: 3:16-3:20 p.m. EDT
Buffalo, New York: 3:18-3:22 p.m. EDT
Burlington, Vermont: 3:26-3:29 p.m. EDT
Lancaster, New Hampshire: 3:27-3:30 p.m. EDT
Caribou, Maine: 3:32-3:34 p.m. EDT
I am so jealous if you are in or close to the line of totality! Regardless of whether or not you’re in that direct line, you may be planning on checking the eclipse out anyway. I know I am! If you are planning to watch any part of it, you probably bought the specialized glasses for safe viewing. And that’s great! One of my most vivid memories of the 2017 eclipse was the former President of the United States looking up at it without glasses. Don’t be like that guy. Here’s some ways to safely view the eclipse, courtesy of USA Today:
Unlike partial solar eclipses, a total eclipse offers spectators a unique opportunity to gaze upon it with the naked eye, but only when the moon completely blocks out the sun and darkness falls – referred to as totality.
While you’re unlikely to go blind, gazing directly at the sun’s rays can do some serious damage to your retinas. So until the moment that totality occurs, proper safety eyewear is still a must, according to NASA.
While some welding goggles may work, the best option for eclipse viewing remains certified eyewear, which is held to an international safety standard and is 100,000 times darker than most sunglasses to block nearly all visible, infrared and ultraviolet light.
Solar eclipse glasses are readily available from plenty of vendors across the internet, but if you want to save some cash, there’s a good chance your local library or another public institution is giving them away for free. Just watch out for cheap imitations. To make it easy while you’re shopping online, the American Astronomical Society maintains a curated list of approved vendors. Another simple method is to create your own pinhole projector to project the sun onto a nearby surface. The American Astronomical Society offers helpful instructions to set them up as well.
Also, one more thing to note is to not drive during the eclipse. People may get behind the wheel thinking that they don’t care or they’re only going to glance at it, but that feels like one of those cases of the best laid plans and all that. While my area is not in the path of totality, we are expected to get within 70-86%, so I bought the special eclipse glasses for me and my family to use to watch them. Just to be on the safe side, People has a great guide to test whether or not you have real solar eclipse glasses. If you’re planning on watching the eclipse today, make sure you’re doing it safely!
My area also didn’t get the eclipse at 100% back in 2017, but it still went pretty dark. I actually do remember the eerie, yet very full silence of the moment. It was really powerful. There won’t be another total solar eclipse until August 2044, and that one will start in Greenland and go through Canada before finishing up in just three US States: Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Things like this feel pretty humbling, like they’re forcing us to sit up, take in, and recognize the bigger picture of the world around us.
Photos credit: Yorick Jansens/Anthony Dehez/Belga Press/Avalon, Egmont Strigl/ImageBroker/Avalon, and Getty
Your local library has been out of glasses for 2 weeks. Please leave them alone. 😭
I went to my library in Miami Saturday and got them. They had plenty so it doesn’t hurt to ask. I guess it’s probably a different story along the actual route.
As a public library employee, yes!
Ours got a big donation last night. We are in the path of totality. I’ve been anxiously following the forecast and it’s looking good!
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/apr/08/solar-eclipse-eye-damage-test
Hope it’s helpful!
Can we see any of it in East Africa ?
hi, @nubia, i looked it up, and it seems none of the eclipse will be visible from eastern african or eastern europe 🙁
Heading down shortly to the St, Lawrence Seaway to set up in parking lot by a Tim Horton’s. Then sit around all day waiting but they said the traffic would be bad. Bright and sunny now but clouds are supposed to roll in just about starting time!
I’ll be working during the time we get a partial eclipse here (not far north enough from Boston for a total eclipse)
But I hope to see what I saw in 2017:
The blinds on my office window have little holes from top to bottom where the blind cords pass through and the sun coming through those holes made a line of dozens of little eclipses across my desk. It was pretty cool 😎
Oh, I love that!
Ooo, I’m totally jealous! I love stuff like that: eclipses, Northern lights, shooting stars… Protect your eyes and enjoy this over there☺️
I have my glasses ready to go! I’m pulling the boys out of school early (or else dismissal is during the eclipse and I feel confident that at least one of them will stare right at it, lol) and we’re going to meet up with some neighbors for an eclipse viewing party. We aren’t in the path of totality, but I think we’re supposed to get 87-90% so I’m excited.
I live in southern New Hampshire and was planning on venturing north, but I really couldn’t stomach the traffic, and the late mud season from the snowfall from last week’s nor’easter. Since it will be 94.7% totality, we’re having charcuterie and wine in the driveway. I still have snow in the yard, but it should be gone in a few days.
Here’s a link to see how much of the eclipse you will be able to witness in the United States
https://www.univision.com/especiales/noticias/infografias/2024/eclipse-solar-2024-en/?mibextid=xfxF2i
Thank you for the link!
Jezebel had a good (a bit depressing, but well written) article about it:
https://www.jezebel.com/the-eclipse-is-peak-monoculture-and-i-hope-you-savor-it
Not sure if the link will go through here, but it’s one of Jezebel’s top stories right now.
Thanks for sharing!
Cool link, thanks!
I go on a bird-watching hike every day and am planning to be out during the eclipse (we’ll only get 80% here.) I’m excited to see if the birds change their behavior – especially the pair of Sandhill cranes that often hangs out with me!
Very cool!
If you get a chance, post back a quick note about what you find.
Signed- a fellow birder who wishes she had taken the day off to be out in nature this afternoon
Will do, North of Boston! I wish you could get out, too!
Hi North of Boston! We had 89% strength of the eclipse today and I didn’t notice any change in the songbirds, ducks, or geese. My crane friend did seem a little agitated, but that could also be because there were way more people around than usual. (I didn’t see her mate since he was hunkered down on their nest deep in the marsh.) 🙂
Thanks!
Glad you got out there!
We’re at 98% and I’m getting my kid out of school early BUT IT IS CLOUDY. 😭😭😭
i’m in st. louis, and we’re at 99%. we were pretty close to totality then, too. my does a great job at encourage everyone to see it-they give us glasses, moon pies and sunny d’s! it’s pretty fun.
I know nobody here needs to hear this, I think it’s really important to emphasize to everyone around you that your retinas won’t feel pain- someone might think they can look without protection and say “well that didn’t hurt!” and think it’s gonna be okay, but the damage will already be done.
People also need to remember to put on sunscreen
The photo of Trump looking directly into the last one will always be one of the funniest things about him.
Most people (that I know of) don’t ever look directly at the sun on any given day. I try, find it it hard to excuse people that ignore warnings. Even with our very expensive welding helmet, we were careful. It was cool. The helmet has an automatic darkening thing. I’m not technical. It was looking at light that quickly turned to shade and you could see the progression.
Interesting observbation, we have a very active bush with birds due to a feeder we feed. Normally it’s pretty active during the time of the eclipse in our area. Not today. About 15 after, very busy & chatty.
Ready to go in Indiana….just 30% cloudy, so I’m pretty excited about it, we should get complete totality…woohoo!
Supposed to get 85% here in NJ and the sky is pretty clear, finally!
I saw on TV that you can use a kitchen colander to use as the pinholes to project the eclipse onto a flat surface (don’t look at the sun, stand with your back to it, holding the colander).
Same show said DO NOT POINT YOUR CELL PHONE CAMERA at the sun! It could damage it beyond repair (just like your eyes).
I don’t trust the dang plastic glasses, so I’m using the old school method of hole in cardboard or the colander trick.
I’m in DFW and it is completely cloudy right now. 😭 I hope it clears up in the next couple of hours.
I’m working from home today, not a normal for me, but I’m in the 99.8 % area and I didn’t want to miss it. Started out rainy and cloudy but the sun is peaking out now and I’m truthfully getting a little excited.
I just spent 42 minutes on the phone with my 87 year old mom- who lives in the path of totality, but is afraid to go outside on her own for fear of losing balance- set up with NASA’s live broadcast via YT in case this could help anyone else:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MJY_ptQW1o
Super cool! Thanks for the link. I live in the PNW & it was a total nothingburger here, not helped by partially cloudy skies. And I lived in Hawaii for the last one, so missed that. Links like this is great for a lot of us!
We will in totality on the deck here in western NYS! It’s cloudy but I have hope 🥰
I drove up from Houston to DFW for it, and the forecast for the past week has been dire. We were anticipating disappointment and total cloud cover today, and it *was* very cloudy and overcast for most of the morning, but then around the time the eclipse got going, the clouds began to disperse and it was almost totally clear by the time we got to the totality. it was absolutely stunning!!
I was reading that can be a common effect with solar eclipses, actually- with the moon blocking the heat of the sun and the temperature dropping, low lying clouds, which are what we had here, tend to dissipate. the change in temperature really disrupts the weather pattern forecasts rely on. It was supposed to be cloudy and then stormy the whole rest of the day, but it’s stayed mostly clear and it’s all happening over night instead. Gorgeous, gorgeous day.