On August 21, 2017, America will get to see a total solar eclipse. This is a truly historic event. The last eclipse to touch US soil was in 1991, and there won’t be another until 2024.
Moreover, a remarkable number of Americans will be able to see the eclipse in its totality. It will cut a wide swath across Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina. The entire event will take about an hour and a half, beginning at 10:15am PST in Oregon, and ending at 2:49pm EST in South Carolina.
Luckily we live in Wyoming, so we don’t have to travel far. Hotels around Grand Teton National Park are already sold out! We were told by one hotel owner that various astronomy tour groups have blocked out most rooms.
If you want the best chance of avoiding rain, go to Wyoming. It’s a dry climate with plenty of wide-open spaces in the path of totality. Rain never lasts long here (famous last words).
Sadly, “Illinois” is just the southern tip. But now I have a year’s notice to devise a supervillain-style plan to knock the Earth off its axis and steer the eclipse path over Chicago.
I hadn’t started a thread but I’ve mentioned this event on the Dope a few times. I am in Topeka, Kansas, so will only have to drive north a ways to experience totality.
I found it amusing to check on the availability of motel/hotel rooms in communities here in Kansas, and in Nebraska, that will experience totality. Most are already booked up.
In 2024 there will be another total solar eclipse that will arc up from southern Texas and exit at Maine. So a good portion of the country will get another one fairly soon. There’s a moderate sized town in Illinois name Carbondale that is at the point the paths of the two eclipses intersect. So in seven years those folks will get to experience two total eclipses without having to go even a mile out of their way!
This is the same website as in the OP but it shows a different number of days to eclipse(one day difference?) When I clicked on the link in the OP most of it was dark, this one seems to show up better.
We’ve already seen three total solar eclipses: in Hawaii (the “Big One”), outside Paris, and on the island of Guadeloupe. For the one next year, we’ll be staying in the western tip of Kentucky.
I booked several months ago, and got one of the very few (at the time) remaining rooms in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. I’m figuring there is a good chance of clear weather on the Plains, with relatively uncrowded highways if a last-day dash is necessary.
I live within the 90%-plus zone, and the totality zone would be a length day trip for me. Even if it’s overcast, we’ll know SOMETHING’S going on.
I witnessed a 60% eclipse in 1994. That was an interesting experience! There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, which was a shade of blue I’ve never seen before or since, and the temperature had dropped about 20 degrees in addition to the streetlights coming on even though it didn’t seem dark. I can totally understand why our ancestors were afraid of them!
Mom lives in the path of totality. Good time for a family visit.
It just happens to be at the same time as a major industry annual conference in Denver. I’ve been asking to be sent to this conference before but never got my turn. Have to bow out of the running for next year.
Here’s AstroBob’s advice, where he talks about trying to make some hotel reservations.
We have relatives in Beatrice NE, so I looked at hotels there: all booked up! We’re going to stay in Lincoln NE, 45 miles away. I hope the roads don’t get too congested.
I saw the 1979 eclipse in Winnipeg. The day was cold but clear. We were on a college band trip for a conference, which ended the day before the eclipse. The band director talked the administration into letting us stay an extra day, and it was certainly much appreciated by the students, even those who had no interested in the eclipse. A total eclipse is certainly nothing to be missed!
I was hoping to get a reservation in Salem, but when I went to find one, back in April, on the very first day that Expedia was taking bookings for that date, every single hotel in town was booked. I eventually found a hotel in Silverton that had one room left, for $300 a night, and booked it.
