Later on today, the Earth will experience a Total Solar Eclipse. This means that for a short period of time, the moon will completely cover the sun. This is an event that occurs every one to three years but the 2024 total solar eclipse is a little more special.
Speaking in a recent YouTube video, science educator Hank Green said: “most of the time that there is a total solar eclipse, it’s just over the ocean and no-one is there to see it.
“This one is over land, over a lot of large cities and a lot of people are going to see it.”
For those who will be travelling to see the eclipse or happen to live in the path of it, NASA said: ” The sky will darken, as if it were dawn or dusk. Weather permitting, people in the path of a total solar eclipse can see the Sun’s corona, the outer atmosphere, which is otherwise usually obscured by the bright face of the Sun.”
Who will be able to see the total solar eclipse?
While there will be parts of the northern hemisphere that will experience this eclipse, it’s mostly going to be passing over Mexico, the United States, and Canada, according to NASA.
The total solar eclipse will begin over the South Pacific Ocean. Weather permitting, the first location in continental North America that will experience totality is Mexico’s Pacific coast. Following this, it will pass through: Texas, and travel through Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.
Additionally, according to NASA, small parts of Tennessee and Michigan will also experience the total solar eclipse.
Eventually, the eclipse will enter Canada in Southern Ontario, and continue through Quebec, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and Cape Breton. The eclipse will exit continental North America on the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
An incredible number of densely-populated cities.
What time does the total solar eclipse happen in the UK?
For the UK, according to the BBC, this path goes across some of England: “if you draw a line from about Fowey in Cornwall to Berwick upon Tweed in Northumberland, then everything west of that line might just get a view of the Moon biting the edge of the Sun as it disappears over the horizon.”
However, if it’s too cloudy or you don’t fall into this radius, you can watch it as it happens on the BBC website livestream.
According to the BBC: “It should be possible to catch a partial eclipse from western parts of the UK just before sunset – weather allowing.”
Why can’t you look directly at an eclipse?
As tempting as this may be — understandably, it’s an eclipse! —, you should not look directly at an eclipse without wearing special eclipse glasses which are very different to sunglasses.
According to Green: “During an eclipse, especially in the latter parts of an eclipse, it’s going to feel like you can look at the sun because it’s going to be way less bright and you’re going to want to!”
However, he warned, even a momentary glimpse can be extremely dangerous: “If you stare at [the eclipse] for just a little too long, you will burn your retina, you will have to go to the doctor, you may never get your vision all the way back.”
Noted. Will stick to the livestream.