Not Eclipse

There was a partial solar eclipse in North America today, but we didn't see it in New York because it's been raining for two days, and also the sun was setting by the time it started. I know Nate and Kyle saw it, because I texted him to find out. They're in beautiful Bryce Canyon today, and the visitor's center was selling eclipse glasses branded for the 2012 transit of Venus. Nate texted me a picture Kyle took from her phone, which was a view through the eyepiece of a ranger's filtered telescope.

The next solar eclipse in North America is a big one, a total eclipse on the afternoon of August 21, 2017, that will be visible along a band that stretches across the whole United States. According to eclipse weather statistics expert Jay Anderson, one of the most promising places to view it may be the Willamette Valley in Oregon. August 21, 2017, is a Monday. Word to the wise: plan to take it off work, and get ready to fly somewhere over the weekend that's expecting clear weather. As Anderson puts it:

The United States has a sophisticated private forecast industry and a great resource in the National Weather Service. Reliable weather forecasts will be available for a week or more before the eclipse, and with a little mobility, no one who wants to travel to see this event should be disappointed.

Then there's going to be another total eclipse on April 8, 2024, going up through Mexico, the Midwest, and then northwest NY State and Canada. So take a long weekend then too. It's a while after that until there's another one that appears over a large portion of the United States, like 2045.

One of the great things about eclipses is that they know precisely when they're all going to be.