I happened to be about 5 miles outside of the 60 mile band width of totality when it came through, and saw 99.7% of the full affect. Much to do about nothing I thought......could feel the temperature dropping as it approached and to the total point,,,,,maybe 10 degrees of so over a 3 minute span. Nowhere near total darkness......I'd compare it with late dusk after the sun drops behind the horizon.
It did confuse the Turtle Doves......they went into their roosting calls, and the cicadas chimed in loudly as well.
The most interesting in this rural area of Southern Illinois was to see the traffic congestion. It definitely drew people into the area.
We were just north of Cave-In-Rock, IL for the eclipse yesterday in a huge private campground with only a handful of others. It's right on the Ohio River across from Kentucky and we were literally feet from the Eastern-Central Time Zone line. Someone had an app on their phone and calculated that we would be 17 seconds short of the full eclipse and one group actually packed up and left so they could go a few miles south into Kentucky to get 'closer'... she was a professional photographer and wanted the 'ultimate' photos. Those of us that were left just kind of chuckled that 5 years from now no one who sees her photos will know the difference in that few miles.
Fuzz, it was definitely that last .03% that made a lot of difference. There was an absolutely stunning 'halo' around the moon and then at the second the moon started to uncover the sun there was what many were referring to as the 'diamond ring' effect... the ring was still there and then the diamond popped out on the ring and then it started to get brighter out very. very fast.
We did feel some drop in the temperature although it was about 93 degrees out and the humidity had to be at least that... so much water in the air that it held the temperature better than dryer air would have.
We had left our dog tied outside but where we could still see him and he didn't even seem to pay much attention. Another dog that was there got a lot more excited.
We had some cloud coverage and there was actually a thunderstorm going on in Shawneetown just up the river 11 miles. We had a huge wall of clouds just that way and just a few little wispy ones drifting around the sun. They stayed away from the sun until about the last 2 or 3 minutes and at that point most everyone had stopped watching anyway. Some people left immediately and there was a huge traffic jam on Illinois Route 1 from the ferry on the river right on up the highway.
I couldn't get my phone to take decent pictures but one of the guys that was there had bought an app for his phone so he could put a filter (he used a pair of the glasses) and still be able to focus. He got several hundred photos and some were awesome. He is going to email me a link when he gets them sorted out. If he will let me share them I'll figure out how to post them somewhere (not on PhotoBucket)!!!
Interestingly enough the 'next' once in a lifetime eclipse will also be a total eclipse here again before it heads to SE Michigan and NW Ohio. I am predicting right now that some of the islands in Lake Erie will have so many visitors that the islands will 'turn turtle' and roll right over
Hopefully we're both healthy enough still to be able to return right here for that eclipse. I told the campground owner that I wanted to 'reserve' my same spot again
I had to correct some of my geography above... we were on the Ohio River... As i was typing that we had just been talking about going north to Peoria and on then to Henry before turning east toward home. As Fuzz knows Henry is on the Illinois River but it has crossed Illinois and merged into the Mississippi north of where he is. The Ohio definitely is the boundary between Illinois and Kentucky.
I hope there weren't any high school students using my post for a reference
Interesting that most of the schools have already started in that area although most were off that day so students could 'observe' the eclipse from their viewing point of choice.
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Topic: Solar eclipse - April 8, 2024 (Read 1948 times)
