Wednesday, September 6, 2017

Aug 21 Eclipse on Pilot Mountain


The Friends of Sauratown Mountains hosted this event on eclipse day. Another support group, Friends of State Parks had donated about 600 viewing glasses. They had sent about 10 times that many to Gorges State Park for folks to witness the eclipse in the Zone of Totality. It rained there and they missed it. We did not.


Enterprising folks built viewing apparatus to see the eclipse projected on a surface. 


Perhaps I should move out of the shade.


Everyone looks so stylish in their viewing glasses.The problem is that you can't see anything but the sun with them.



Our location would give us a 93% complete eclipse. One of the pleasant surprises for me, were the crescent moon shaped sun projections filtering through the tree leaves.


This family made it a science lesson. This gal is holding up a kitchen colander, projecting the eclipsed sun on a piece of cardboard. Enlarge the photo below for better effect. 



The sky darkened as it would before sunset but never got as dark as I was led to think it would.

We sent hundreds of glasses down to the park gate where cars were being turned away. The summit parking lot filled about noon. The eclipse began about 1:20, reached 93% at 2:40 and went on to about 4pm.

Glasses were handed out to those not able to get into the park. Most just viewed the eclipse by the side of the road outside the gate.

Thanks to Debbie Vaden for organizing this event.

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