Terminalcoffee discussion

Are you going to watch the solar eclipse on Monday August 21? Do you have eclipse glasses? Will you be doing the pinhole projection?

Did you fail to locate a pair of glasses and are forced to watch it online?

You can substitute a pair of welding glasses with a shade 14 lens (no other lens is safe).

"On Monday, August 21, 2017, a total solar eclipse will be visible in totality within a band across the entire contiguous United States; it will only be visible in other countries as a partial eclipse."

"The last time a total solar eclipse was visible across the entire contiguous United States was during the June 8, 1918 eclipse, and not since the February 1979 eclipse has a total eclipse been visible from anywhere in the mainland United States."

"The solar eclipse is going to confuse animals — a lot

Early reports of wacky animal behavior during eclipses involve birds. Perhaps the earliest is from a total eclipse in 1544 when “birds ceased singing," while another report from a 1560 eclipse claimed “birds fell to the ground,” according to Science News.

In one of the first documented scientific studies in 1932, researchers spotted bees returning to hives and chickens to roost during an eclipse in New England.

Orb-weaving spiders in Mexico took down their webs during a total eclipse on July 11, 1991, only to start rebuilding them once the sun reappeared, the National Wildlife Federation reported."

"During previous eclipses, elephants in Africa have been spotted heading back toward their sleeping areas, while chimps in a zoo stared at the sky, "baffled by what was going on," Stein said.

Pets like dogs and cats should be less affected by the eclipse than wildlife..." (USA Today)

By Wolfgang Strickling - Eclipse 2017 Android App, Geodata from OpenStreetMap, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...

The blue line shows where a total eclipse will be viewable. Other areas of the United States will have eclipses of 70-90%.

The duration of the maximum eclipse will be 2 minutes 40 seconds.

The event will begin as a partial eclipse on the Oregon coast at 9:06 a.m. PDT and end as a partial eclipse on the South Carolina coast at about 4:06 p.m. EDT.

This is what a total eclipse looks like.


By Damien Deltenre - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...

If you don't have eclipse glasses, you have some other options, like pinhole projection or tree leaves (looking down, not up at the sun):


https://eclipse.aas.org/eye-safety/pr...

This is a neat National Geographic youtube about it. Seemed like a lot of people in the video weren't wearing eclipse glasses....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpH9L...

https://www.vox.com/science-and-healt...

You can enter your zip code here and it will tell you what percentage of the sun will be blocked at the apex.

There is a total eclipse in KC Kansas and in northern Missouri. I'm in the southern suburbs of KC so we will have a partial eclipse here, but still, it'll be cool. If it's not cloudy, that is.

Watching the NASA feeds. Very cloudy and that's unfortunate as I'm in a path of 90%+ totality.

Youndyc wrote: "We had heavy rain earlier, but it has cleared out. Thankfully! I'm sorry, CD, that your weather is not cooperating, that's such a bummer!"

Well it cleared enough that we could see quite a bit. Sort of last minute so everyone went out and there it was.

Dark and spooky!

It was almost entirely overcast here however I was able to share glasses with another person (at the very last minute) and so I saw it. 87% totality. Somehow in spite of being overcast you could still see it. An hour later it was almost completely sunny....

It was cool how it got slightly darker and the temperature dropped about 20 minutes before peak. But it didn't get anywhere near as dark as dusk, which I thought it was supposed to.

Didn't have glasses, but I went outside when the light began to dim. During the peak, birds started singing as if it were early morning, and there was a sudden breeze, along with a drop in temperature. The light was eerie. 88% eclipse here, and a total eclipse would have been even better. Even so, it was impressive. Think of what it must have been like for earlier people who weren't expecting it and who didn't know the cause.

I'll be in 100% totality in 2024! I'm ordering welding helmets long before.