Paul A. Romsky Jr. - Total Solar Eclipse 2024

08 April 2024, a Total Solar Eclipse occured over parts of New England USA. As the Moon fully obscured the Sun, fire and Brimstone begain to rain from the skies, there was a terrible earthquake, lightning, a flood, and the seas turned to blood...

No, but it was the first total solar eclipse I have seen. I had read that it was supposed to be an Annular Eclipse, that is, the Moon is futher from the Earth and thus it does not fully block out the Sun - leaving a thin edge of the Sun's photosphere showing - which is called the "Ring of Fire". But this turned out to be a Total Eclipse where the Moon completely blocks the Sun's Photosphere and the Sun's outer atmophere, the Corona, is visible. My wife and I traveled two and a half hours (plus 2 hours and 15 minutes in traffic delays) to get up to an area in Vermont where totality was to occur. We picked a town called Lyndonville which was a little bit north of our destination of Saint Johnsbury. This was well within the track for totality but not in the center of the track, it was about a dozen arc seconds south and not overcrowded like more towns centered in the solar track of the area where we were located.

We found a great viewing spot on a side road next to an open field and set-up right beside the road edge. This spot would give us a total eclipse with just a tiny thin overhanging edge near the bottom of the Moon. I used my 114 mm Tasco Telescope and projected the image onto a white foam screen that I made for viewing the Sun. I used my telescope's StarGuide Tracker that was set up to follow the Sun across the sky. As I was setting up my telescope, it had shifted during transport and rolled on top of the power connecter that I had added years ago. The factory connector was prone to disconnecting, so I replaced it with a screw on connector, but it too turned out to be unreliable. I had to open up the unit, and wire the power cord direcly to wires inside. Just then a family from Brooklyn, New York City stopped by and asked if they could join us. I said sure. The father happened to be a Paramedic and he gave me some surgical tape to cover the wire splices I had to make for the power cord. My "McGuyver Skills" as my wife called me, worked... we were back in business.

I use a car battery jump starter gel pack to power my telescope which gives me 8 hours of tracking on a single charge, we only needed an hour for this event. By the time I had the telecope aligned, the Moon was already staring its transit across the sun (only about 10% at that point). This was perfect as I had seen such before.

It did a fairly good job but I still had to jog the telescope every few minutes to keep the Sun in the center of the field of view. This is a very safe way to observe the Sun, plus it magnifies the image on the screen. I saw two distinct sunspots (cooler magnetic storms) on the Sun.

Then a couple from Boston here on an education visa from Germany asked if they could join us. All were welcome as many can stand around the screen to observe. Just before totality, the family from Brooklyn called their family that lived in the area and our party grew to about 20 people. My projection method to view the eclipse worked well as I was able to point out sunspots to the group and to let others see the eclipse that didn't have special vieweing glasses. We had a great time talking with everyone. A 14 year old boy from the Brooklyn family was very ethusiastic about the event and I enjoyed sharing our knowlege on the eclipse and other science topics.

As we watched the Moon slowly cover more and more of the Sun, all of our excitement grew. As the sun became more like a point source, shadows on the ground became shaper. That 14 year old boy showed me how you can spread out and cross your fingers to make small aperatures that projected the eclipse on the ground. A very clever way to observe it. Everything seemed like normal daylight (about 3:15 PM Eastern Standard Time) until the final 15 seconds before totality started. In those few seconds, it was like someone was dimming the light around us. It was surreal, like being in a room with the lights dimming, but being outside. During totality, the Corona was clearly visible with our naked eyes, you did not need to use special glasses to look at the Sun during totality for a few seconds at a time. I had always been told that looking directly at the Sun during totality, even the Corona during totality, would be too bright to safely view. But that was not true in this case. The sky was crystal clear and the Sun was bright, but as soon as totality started, it was safe as long as you did not stare at it for more than a few seconds at a time. In fact, after looking and closing my eyes, I didn't even see a "flash spot" (like you get after someone takes your picture and you looked at the flash), there was nothing like that at all. During totality, you cound not see the eclipse too well with the special galsses. The Corona was very dim on the screen, but we were in darkness at that point which helped to see it. On the lower edge of a Moon we could see a Solor Prominence which appeared as small red area, there was also a smaller promience to the lower right. Prominences are arcs of plasma that rise far arove the Sun's surface - most often from a sunspot area. Usally the plasma returns to the Sun, but sometimes it ejects matter and energy from the Sun. They move realtivly slowly because of their size, so these lasted for the whole eclipse.

It was dark, like it was 9PM around the first evening of summer (say, an hour and a half after sunset), but you can still see about. I would say it was between Nautical and Astonomical twilight, but the sky around the entire horizon was brightly lit by the Sun. I had never seen anything like it. We were in the darkest shadow of the Moon - the Umbra. Venus was clear to the lower right of the eclipse, you could just make out its cresent shape from the Sun without any visual aids. Someone said a few bright stars were visible. I had planned to find Jupiter as well, but I was so caught up in the excitement of that amzing image of what I was seeing in the sky, I forgot to look for it (to the upper left of the Sun/Moon conjunction). Later I saw very good color photos of the eclipse. During totality you can see the red prominences, and the near side edge of the Moon was lit (about 10%) from the light reflecting off of the Earth's oceans that were not in the Moon's shadow - you could see the "flames" apperance of the prominences and the Moon's surface features in those photos, but to the eye the Corona is too bright and washes them out - unless you used special photographic techniques.

Totality lasted just over 3 minutes, and suddenly, it was as if the lights were turned up again (very smoothly) and within 15 seconds we were in bright sunlight again.

My wife and I had had a great time with everyone and it was one of the best astronomical/social events that we had ever experienced. The couple from Germany (Fabian and Florian) took our picture with a Instax instant camera (see below) - a nice momento. After the eclipse has started waning, the brother of the father from the Brooklyn family passed around plstic cups and gave everyone (except the children of course) a splash of Sthilwater Black Bourbon to toast the event. That was a very smooth and mellow Bourbon. I kept my cup as a momento too.

My wife was asked if it was worth the 8 hours we spent traveling for a very rare 3 minute event - the answer was a very assured YES!. This was the first time in our lives that a total solar eclipse was within a day's travling distance and the weather was perfect for viewing... we had to see it.

While I was fixing my telescope, not knowing if I could get it to work, getting frustrated, and composing myself in front of children; that 14 year old boy (I regret getting his name - he is in the center of the 2nd photo) was asking me questions. One was why I didn't use glasses like everyone else was using. I told him I didn't trust them. He then said something so profound that it brought me back from the brink - from where I just wanted to pack everything up and go home. He said, "If we do not trust, we do not grow." He then said, "God had brought us all togther today for a purpose." I was instantly calmed by his words... I had no choice, I had to continue and not throw in the towel.









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