Total Solar Eclipse, April 8, 2024

[DavisStraight]

13 minutes ago, ChangeofSeasonsWX said:

Yeah it always shocks me how much people take these events for granted. I would die for the opportunity to see totality from my backyard. I wasn't able to go north for this one and missed it. Total solar eclipses are probably one of the greatest celestial events you can witness. I'm too far south to see Aurora Borealis, and the next totality won't be until May 1, 2079. I took a trip to Alaska which wasn't cheap and planned on seeing the northern lights but that fell through the floor also. Just can't catch a break.

My wife caught the northern lights in Iceland, she went for 4 days a couple years ago. I'd be happy to visit Alaska even if I missed the lights.

[HIPPYVALLEY]

22 minutes ago, DavisStraight said:

My wife caught the northern lights in Iceland, she went for 4 days a couple years ago. I'd be happy to visit Alaska even if I missed the lights.

I saw a Northern Lights display in Northern Vermont about 15 years ago that warped my reality. I was up in the Northeast Kingdom and watched towers of swirling green, blue and pink lights that left me and my hiking buddy speechless.

[WxWatcher007]

There’s nothing like a celestial event. Last year when we were able to catch a faint glimpse of the lights it was incredible, and when I saw the Milky Way for the first time it was one of the most profound moments of my life—no hyperbole. 

[Ginx snewx]

5 hours ago, wxeyeNH said:

Ginx and I are the same age.  If we are still around in 2045 I am going to send him south for the next good eclipse in the US.  The trip will be on me!!  Once he experiences totality he won't  be saying meh anymore!

Thanks Gene. Wish you liked the Raiders this much though.lol

[wxsniss]

4 hours ago, powderfreak said:

Life has its ups and downs... you win some and lose some.  However, the factors that lined up to make this possible were pretty incredible.

This has been the wettest year, winter, whatever on record for some spots in New England.  It has precipitated a lot, it's been murky, we are back into it for a few days right now up here.  Its cloudy and damp right now, changing to cloudy and wet high elevation snow and valley rain showers over the weekend.

It has been so wet.  For so long.  However for this rare cosmic event the universe gave us euphoric weather.  Even without the eclipse, that sunshine and warmth (even in snow covered areas) would've been a banner day.  Throw in totality during the peak awesomeness of the weather/afternoon.  Mind-blowing.

How did we get so lucky?  It could've been 35F with dense fog and/or thick stratus with ease.  The fact that it wasn't raining and instead was perfect weather during this unstoppable event, damn.

So many great perspectives in this thread, and this another understated aspect of how this all implausibly came together perfectly: How the hell did NNE get such flawless weather?

Literally the best in the nation. After such a wet winter.

Multiple reports of people abandoning their Texas flights and driving up from Virginia/Carolinas to VT/NH/ME, or wagons east from NY:

https://www.boston.com/community/tell-us/readers-cancelled-flights-to-texas-and-traveled-to-new-england-for-the-solar-eclipse/

I actually had trouble sleeping Saturday night giddy with what the Euro/GFS and then NAM/HRRR were locking in for cloud cover... the amazement that we might actually pull this off.

[mreaves]

It had a pretty big impact up here. Vermont officials estimate 160K people drove to the state for Monday’s eclipse.  We went up by KMPV to watch and there must have been 20 small planes lining the runway.

[LibertyBell]

16 hours ago, #NoPoles said:

I'd love to go intercept totality in Egypt. Would make great pics with the pyramids. Also Australia sounds like another great choice to intercept totality

That's in August 2027!  Also 0% possibility of clouds in the desert!  Luxor Egypt will be the place to be with over 6 minutes of totality!

[Angus]

@HIPPYVALLEYre: Iceland. I looked at the map of totality - the pictures below are from the area (westfjords) in northwestern corner of iceland in July 2017. Barren and beautiful. We took a ferry from Stykkishólmur, arrived in Brjánslækur and drove a big clockwise loop back to Stykkishólmur - literally 20 hour day if I recall. Most of the roads (or all) were gravel/dirt. I remember us laughing that the scenery was so beautiful that it got to be ho-hum. This was the most spectacular area we visited IMO.

 

 

[mreaves]

From the Jay Peak Facebook page.

[NoCORH4L]

55 minutes ago, Angus said:

@HIPPYVALLEYre: Iceland. I looked at the map of totality - the pictures below are from the area (westfjords) in northwestern corner of iceland in July 2017. Barren and beautiful. We took a ferry from Stykkishólmur, arrived in Brjánslækur and drove a big clockwise loop back to Stykkishólmur - literally 20 hour day if I recall. Most of the roads (or all) were gravel/dirt. I remember us laughing that the scenery was so beautiful that it got to be ho-hum. This was the most spectacular area we visited IMO.

 

 

Agree. I went to Westfjords in 2016, most beautiful part of Iceland I thought. Lots of nice hot springs as well. We stayed over in a couple different places though. Lots of 1 lane tunnels and bridges lol.

[NoCORH4L]

10 hours ago, DavisStraight said:

When I was in the pool in Sarasota, I met a guy from Ohio who lives in the path of totality, he said he wanted to get out of there before all the people came and took over his town with a traffic jams. I asked if he ever witnessed one, he said no. I said I hear it's a pretty spectacular event and you could watch it from your own yard, he said his give a shit meter didn't register. I was a bit dumbfounded; I would have at least stayed home to see it at least once to see what the excitement was all about.

It's a certain type of person that appreciates an eclipse. There's a reason it seemed like a lot of high-end cars and electric cars, at least what I saw in the traffic and not so many GMC 2500 HDs. 

I was one of the few pick ups trucks I saw walking around Island Pond, versus at NASCAR I'm just one in a sea of pick ups.

[nrgjeff]

Down South we saw more cars like yours @NoCORH4L haha! New England you have the best eclipse thread so figured I'd stop by again. I'd switched to Ohio Valley, but we ended up viewing from North Arkansas. 

From several pages ago @NW_of_GYX those were shadow bands on the snow. I bet that was a whole lot cooler than laying down a white sheet like we did!

My longer write-up is on page 4 of the Lakes/Ohio Valley Region. Thread isn't quite as long as this one. 

Back to topics of this page, I agree Totality is thee premier event. Ranks.
1. Totality of a solar eclipse is the most awesome and most personal experience at the same time.
2. Aurora is a close second. It's not as emotional but it lasts longer and it's still an incredible light.
3. Tornadoes are a distant 3rd. My chase partner thinks I'm nuts. I know what I feel.
4. Bright naked eye comets might actually be better than tornadoes, but it's been a minute. Hale-Bopp and Hyakutake. 
5. Switch to geology, things like Yosemite Valley and the Na Pali Coast.

Bottom line: Totality is bar none the most exceptional and inspirational event witnessed from this 3rd rock.

[tamarack]

17 hours ago, ariof said:

I'm sort of wondering about your strategy, but it sounds like you probably didn't hit the road until 1700 or so.

From Eustis at least I wonder if the optimal route would have been to get to Kingfield and then take 142 down to 156. There are enough branching roads south of there that it may have been possible to do so. The whole idea here was to avoid converging roadways (especially if you were on the secondary road in a merge) and seek out branches, and where possible think about three steps ahead of the average driver (one step ahead = taking the parallel road to the interstate, two steps ahead is a different route, three steps ahead is a parallel road to a different route). Get beyond what can be solved algorithmically, use intuition. Google is not smart enough to predict where there will be backups 30 minutes after totality ends. Try to figure that out, and go elsewhere!

It was 6:15 PM before I cleared Kingfield, but south of there it was clear sailing.  The road itself is much better than the twisting 142/156 and the latter goes near downtown Wilton, with stop signs, etc.   Might've gotten some cars with folks who climbed Tumbledown, too.  Of course, I ducked around Farmington and drove thru Industry instead.  My wife and friend tried Town Farm Road rather than Main Street as they went back to the friend's house near the Fairbanks Bridge over the Sandy.  Neither way was fun, as those coming down Rt 4 from Rangeley were diverted onto Town Farm while the "Loaf traffic went thru town.

Decent article describing the event, and traffic, on the local online news:  dailybulldog.com .  Some nice pics, too, including one taken from the obs platform atop Oquossoc Bald, showing folks on the ground below.  The article noted 2,500+ at Saddleback and 10k+ at Sugarloaf, where the access road was closed to additional cars by 8:30 Monday morning.

re: aurora.  We saw this several times when we lived in Fort Kent, usually when it was about -20.

[ChangeofSeasonsWX]

I was thinking about going to Luxor, Egypt for the 2027 eclipse but I'm nervous about my safety there.

[HoarfrostHubb]

5 hours ago, NoCORH4L said:

Agree. I went to Westfjords in 2016, most beautiful part of Iceland I thought. Lots of nice hot springs as well. We stayed over in a couple different places though. Lots of 1 lane tunnels and bridges lol.

We went in 2021 and were lucky enough to hike the active volcano.  But we didn't get to the Westfjords.  Next trip for sure.   

[HoarfrostHubb]

2 hours ago, ChangeofSeasonsWX said:

I was thinking about going to Luxor, Egypt for the 2027 eclipse but I'm nervous about my safety there.

If you go with a group you will probably be ok.  Stay in a nicer hotel.   

[wxsniss]

On 4/8/2024 at 5:30 PM, NW_of_GYX said:

Well that was cool. Also saw some weird light wave effect happening on the snow in the field just before and after totality. Can’t post videos or else I’d share.




 

Just saw this... Funny at Prouty Beach in Newport, ~1-2 minutes before and after totality, a group of guys ran over to a snow pile yelling "snakes in the snow!". My wife for a moment thought they saw actual snakes.

As @nrgjeff posted, must have been shadow bands. Here's a good example from Tennessee 2017 for those who haven't seen:

 

[LibertyBell]

47 minutes ago, wxsniss said:

Just saw this... Funny at Prouty Beach in Newport, ~1-2 minutes before and after totality, a group of guys ran over to a snow pile yelling "snakes in the snow!". My wife for a moment thought they saw actual snakes.

As @nrgjeff posted, must have been shadow bands. Here's a good example from Tennessee 2017 for those who haven't seen:

 

The best way I've seen this explained is that air is a fluid like water so a good analogy is a swimming pool full of water.  When the sun shines on this pool you can see little shadows shimmering in the water even when there's no wind.  These are what shadow bands are like.

My question is why do we need a total eclipse to see this effect?  Why don't we see it all the time, just like we do in a swimming pool?

 

[ChangeofSeasonsWX]

2 hours ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

If you go with a group you will probably be ok.  Stay in a nicer hotel.   

I mean I am still debating whether southern Spain or Egypt is a better option. I haven't calculated the expense difference but both Spain and Egypt will be expensive. 4 minutes 30 seconds of totality in Southern Spain versus 6 minutes 22 seconds in Egypt. In your opinion do you think that it would be worth going to Egypt for those extra two minutes of totality? I've never experienced 100% totality so I dont know if its worth it? Plus I'm not really familiar with either country but I'm assuming that Spain is more modernized than Egypt.

[HoarfrostHubb]

15 minutes ago, ChangeofSeasonsWX said:

I mean I am still debating whether southern Spain or Egypt is a better option. I haven't calculated the expense difference but both Spain and Egypt will be expensive. 4 minutes 30 seconds of totality in Southern Spain versus 6 minutes 22 seconds in Egypt. In your opinion do you think that it would be worth going to Egypt for those extra two minutes of totality? I've never experienced 100% totality so I dont know if its worth it? Plus I'm not really familiar with either country but I'm assuming that Spain is more modernized than Egypt.

I guess it depends on what else you want to do. Spain is supposedly incredibly beautiful. But Egypt looks amazing. I’ve never been to either 

[DavisStraight]

1 hour ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

I guess it depends on what else you want to do. Spain is supposedly incredibly beautiful. But Egypt looks amazing. I’ve never been to either 

Years ago we had a trip to Egypt planned before 9/11, after that we nixed it. Would like to see it one day though.

[powderfreak]

4 hours ago, ChangeofSeasonsWX said:

I mean I am still debating whether southern Spain or Egypt is a better option. I haven't calculated the expense difference but both Spain and Egypt will be expensive. 4 minutes 30 seconds of totality in Southern Spain versus 6 minutes 22 seconds in Egypt. In your opinion do you think that it would be worth going to Egypt for those extra two minutes of totality? I've never experienced 100% totality so I dont know if its worth it? Plus I'm not really familiar with either country but I'm assuming that Spain is more modernized than Egypt.

The longer the totality, the better.  But 4+ min vs 6+ min are both solidly long.  The key is totality.  Other factors like cost, ease of access, accommodations/flights would play into that decision… both are solid totality sites.

Tying an event like that into a bonafide vacation/exploration trip would be wild.

[AstronomyEnjoyer]

5 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

The best way I've seen this explained is that air is a fluid like water so a good analogy is a swimming pool full of water.  When the sun shines on this pool you can see little shadows shimmering in the water even when there's no wind.  These are what shadow bands are like.

My question is why do we need a total eclipse to see this effect?  Why don't we see it all the time, just like we do in a swimming pool?

 

One reason relates to why stars will "twinkle" at night, while some of the planets do not. (See link)-> https://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/General/twinkle.html 

Just before the Sun is totally eclipsed, many of the same optical properties apply, thus allowing one to see atmospheric perturbations. 

[ChangeofSeasonsWX]

2 hours ago, powderfreak said:

The longer the totality, the better.  But 4+ min vs 6+ min are both solidly long.  The key is totality.  Other factors like cost, ease of access, accommodations/flights would play into that decision… both are solid totality sites.

Tying an event like that into a bonafide vacation/exploration trip would be wild.

Yeah the good thing about eclipses is that we know exactly when and where they will occur, whereas the northern lights, although much more common, are very illusive. I took a major trip to Alaska during prime season hoping to see the northern lights and I never did. At least with this eclipse it's more than likely going to be cloud free with an amazing view. The crowds are going to be a killer though.

I wish I could be alive for the July 2186 eclipse so that I could tell people that I witnessed the longest eclipse for over 10,000 years. How cool would that be? Hopefully I can at least make August 2027 and 2045 happen.

[eekuasepinniW]

I feel like every explanation for shadow bands I've read over the last week has only left me progressively more and more confused. 

[eyewall]

Here is my composite shot from my experience. I used a Seestar S50 to capture these:

[powderfreak]

3 hours ago, eyewall said:

Here is my composite shot from my experience. I used a Seestar S50 to capture these:

Wild.  Shows the intersect angle so well.  Paths crossing in a once in a lifetime experience.

[eyewall]

3 hours ago, powderfreak said:

Wild.  Shows the intersect angle so well.  Paths crossing in a once in a lifetime experience.

Definitely and I will never forget it!

[Saguaro]

It's been a long week and I just now have gotten the time to write up my experience Monday. I was deciding between Colebrook, northern VT, or Eustis area. In the end given the satellite cloud trend, and to maximize totality time, I went for Third Connecticut Lake on the Quebec border.

There were no clouds to speak of, not even cirrus, so viewing was perfect. Conditions in the area were still pretty set in Winter, with the lake frozen over thick enough that most people were out on it in chairs and had tripods set up. The snowcover was at least a foot deep if not more.

The eclipse itself was magnificent, and it looked better overall that the 2017 one I saw in Idaho which was marred by a thin haze of forest fire smoke. The corona looked a lot larger this go around, and the large flare at the bottom stood out. I regret forgetting to look for shadow banding in the minute before and after totality. I imagine on the expansive snowcover of the lake, it would be very easy to notice. I'm wondering if anyone got video of it in that area. I do not have any decent camera gear so I was only able to manage a phone picture pre-totality and short video during.

The drive back took at least twice as long as normal, about 5 hours, thanks to closures of alternate routes to US 3, and an enormous backup in Errol that took over an hour to get through. It was still worth seeing and I'm glad I was able to experience it.

It's amazing the weather cooperated so well with the timing. Right after I went back to Arizona, the usual spring time perpetual gloom, cold, and dampness settled in to plague Maine for what looks like a long stay.

 

[mcglups]

7 hours ago, Saguaro said:

I'm wondering if anyone got video of it in that area. I do not have any decent camera gear so I was only able to manage a phone picture pre-totality and short video during.

The drive back took at least twice as long as normal, about 5 hours, thanks to closures of alternate routes to US 3, and an enormous backup in Errol that took over an hour to get through. It was still worth seeing and I'm glad I was able to experience it.

Good stuff! I was also planning on Colebrook but upon arrival earlier than expected I ventured up to Pittsburg and landed at Lake Francis (and in doing so I now know there are 3 Connecticut Lakes!)

I have a video, similar to my pictures, it isn't great, but will find a way to share it.

The traffic getting through Colebrook was expected (1 hour or so) but the Errol backup wasn't expected and took about as long. All things considered, this is beautiful countryside so it was perfectly fine.

Day 6 after the experience and still in awe