This means, among other things, that you will need to take local traffic conditions into account when calculating your arrival time at your chosen destination. Because an eclipse doesn’t last long, and totality during the eclipse is even shorter, it’s important to prepare for this event well ahead of time. But many Americans will need to travel to see the total blackout occur. If you’re lucky enough to live within the path of totality, you need only walk out on your street or in your backyard to see the eclipse. How Should I Prepare to Watch the 2024 Solar Eclipse? This map developed by Xavier Jubier allows you to see the path in full and type in your destination of choice.Īlong the way, the following large cities, along with hundreds of smaller municipalities, will witness totalityĪ small portion of eastern Canada, including the cities of Hamilton and Montreal, will see totality as well. The eclipse will track northeast, making a broad, scythe-like track through the heart of Texas, up across the southeastern corner of Oklahoma, and then through Arkansas, a thin sliver of northwest Kentucky, and parts of Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. Central Standard Time at Eagle Pass in southwest Texas, with totality starting at 1:27 p.m. In the United States, the eclipse will start at 12:10 p.m. If you are anywhere within this miles-wide path, you will be able to witness the eclipse in its totality-in other words, a total eclipse of the sun. The path of totality will be 120 miles wide where it enters the United States and will taper slightly as it crosses the country. How Can I Track the Eclipse?įiguring out where to see the eclipse in its totality involves a review of the 2024 solar eclipse path. Why is this important? It matters because viewing a partial eclipse is interesting, but viewing a total eclipse is phenomenal. Thus, the totality will last for approximately four minutes and twenty-seven seconds in southwest Texas, but only around three minutes and forty-five seconds in Buffalo, New York, 1784 miles away. Further, the duration of totality will decrease as the eclipse moves northeastward across the United States. Viewers in the center of the path will see longer periods of totality than viewers at either edge. Totality will also vary somewhat depending on where the viewer is in the eclipse path. The period of totality, by contrast, will last only a short time within the eclipse. The duration of the 2024 eclipse, starting from the moment at which the moon starts to move across the face of the sun, dimming its light and then into the period of totality, when the sun is 100% obscured and progressing to the point at which the last portion of the moon moves past the sun and the sun returns to full brilliance, will last over two hours. When the moon completely covers the sun, on the other hand, the event is called a total eclipse -and this condition of complete coverage is referred to as totality. If the coverage is incomplete, the event is a partial eclipse. Technically, an eclipse occurs whenever any part of the moon hides any part of the sun. The bottom line is that 2024 will be a great chance to make a lasting memory of this rare celestial phenomenon. And after April of 2024, there won’t be another total solar eclipse widely viewable from the U.S. For example, before 2017, the last coast-to-coast total solar eclipse took place in 1918. Incidentally, it’s very unusual to have another eclipse take place only seven years after its predecessor. As terrific as that event was, though, the 2024 eclipse-the “Even Greater American Eclipse?”-will be bigger and last longer than the event in 2017. It was dubbed the " Great American Eclipse," and an estimated 215 million people viewed the event, either in person or remotely. The last total solar eclipse viewable from the United States occurred in 2017. In short, a total eclipse is a spectacular demonstration of the mechanics of our solar system. Tendrils of light emanating from the sun radially can be seen behind the moon, lending the event an awesome, otherworldly appearance. A solar eclipse is an event that over centuries of recorded history has inspired awe, inspiration, and a certain amount of fear among human beings. This also means that when conditions are right, the moon can totally block out the sun, turning day into night in the middle of the afternoon. The result is that the moon appears to us to be almost the same size as the sun. While the moon is much smaller than the sun, it’s also much closer to us here on Earth. A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes in its orbit between the earth and our local star, the sun.
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