Just as predicted, a celestial spectacle swept across a small patch of earth near Lake Erie, leaving onlookers, clad in specially designed glasses, in a state of jolly bewilderment – dogs included. The DJ at the open-air stage wisely paused his music for this great celestial occurrence. Past three o’clock, a drop in temperature was noticed. The sun’s occlusion sped up. Suddenly, the darkness descended, accompanied by a chill. The moon appeared as a perfect circle against the black sky. There was nothing left to do but to remain silent and absorb this incredible sight.
“It was like stepping into another realm,” said Leah Delano from Washington DC when reflecting on the experience later.
“It felt like becoming part of a cosmos we didn’t even know was there,” said her friend, Nancy Chapman, her face breaking into a smile. Their description attempted to put into words an event that, in reality, simply defies them. Surrounding them, individuals grappled for ways to explain what they had just witnessed.
“When I think about it, it was a typical day. We were standing here, looking up at the blue sky and the clouds,” said Delano. “Then in a few minutes, darkness falls. Night and stars appear. You suddenly realise that there is a reality beyond what we see every day. And before you know it, we are back to everyday life. What struck me the most, even more than the corona, were those few moments of complete darkness. That was just breathtaking. If one didn’t know whether the light would return, it would be an incredibly alarming thought.”
And that sums it up. Monday’s ‘Great American Eclipse’ was a blend of awe-inspiring, geeky excitement with a tinge of eeriness. It’s an event that will be etched in the minds of astronomy enthusiasts and will continue to resonate with the lucky millions who witnessed it. Of course, the various townships and cities capitalised on this as a tourist attraction, and Erie saw an exceptional boost in visitor numbers earlier in April. But what everyone understood was that they were partaking in a unique day.
Despite the drizzly morning and cloud cover near Lake Erie, the eagerly anticipated event attracted a great number of visitors. Along the waterfront, a series of enamoured astronomers sat on fold-up chairs behind rows of impressive telescopes. Amongst the crowd was Vincent Filigenzi, who had made the trek from Long Island, New York, especially to witness the spectacle. When asked if he had ever borne witness to an eclipse previously, he immediate recalled the exact date; “March 7th, 1970”. It was an opportune moment during his astronomy studies at Adelphi University. “There was a complete eclipse at Virginia Beach,” he fondly recalled. “Our professor suggested we hire a coach and attend as a class. It was a radiant day, and National Geographic had set themselves up on the beachfront. The whole event was simply marvellous.”
Even though the clouds remained steadfast until well past mid-day, Filigenzi remained entirely hopeful about the experience that awaited him along Erie’s shoreline.
“Who is more fortunate than us?” he questioned rhetorically. “To be positioned in the direct path of a full solar eclipse…the sight draws people from all around the globe.”
In recent times, the sheer unity that this large-scale astronomical event brings has generated much discussion. An estimated 32 million Americans are situated under the path of totality- a 115-mile stretch of Earth spanning North America. It casts regular, often overlooked locations, into the glare of the extraordinary for but a brief moment of time due to the alignment of the sun and moon.
An uncountable number of spectators took the day off from work and put aside their stresses to ensure they were placed beneath that precious path too. The realisation that millions of others were sharing the same spectacle created a sense of community in even the smallest of parks, connecting them to this tremendous event.
The fundamental science behind the eclipse heightened the entire experience, transforming it into something magical and almost imaginary. It was a tantalising and mesmerising sight- as close as one could get to being Elliot, cycling along with an exotic alien passenger in his basket. The scene was breathtakingly beautiful.
Until the final moments, disbelief lingered in the air. One could assume that it was just another but more expeditious sunset in the making. As a result, there was an overwhelming indifference at 3:11pm leading to an utterly unexpected sense of being impressed, humbled, persuaded, appreciative, even a feeling of being favoured, mere four minutes later. Unusually, during these mystical four minutes, the dogs stood alert yet quiet, wearing an expression that seemed to question the upcoming events and its implications for them. Conversely, the surrounding humans were overwhelmed with emotions.
A strange phenomenon was despite the tiny gleam of sunlight, the park was quite illuminated, giving an impression of a cloudy day. Instantaneously, transitioning to the total darkness had a dramatic effect on the people – they were either struck with wonder or were lost in their thoughts. The following phrases provide a glimpse of the people’s reaction during the four minutes when Liberty park was engulfed by darkness and when the cornea – the ideal golden halo of sunlight around the moon – became visible:
“You can see it shrinking!”, “Thirty seconds”, “Oh my gosh, look at the horizon!”, “It’s happening!”, “Oh my God!”, “Woah. Woah. Look at that! Look. At. That!”, “The birds are so f***ing confused, the birds are like: what the hell is happening, bro?”
People interrupted their focused observation only to quickly survey their surroundings for confirmation that what they were experiencing was not due to them being in a trance. Everyone soon realised the reality and a moment of sadness ensued as they acknowledged the fact that the enchantment was unavoidably transient, and that the shadow of normality would soon reemerge replacing the magical Monday afternoon.
“It was about experiencing joy,” expressed Nancy Chapman. “It was mesmerising. But the happiness. The spontaneous human reaction shared by everyone present to cry out, gasp and marvel in unison in response to this breathtaking spectacle of nature was truly remarkable.”
In Erie and elsewhere along the mesmerising darkened trail, individuals wept, celebrated, swapped marital pledges, savoured beverages, and lounged on outdoor rugs, experiencing the remarkable American Eclipse just as NASA’s experts had forecasted. Their final remark was simply: astounding.