Total Eclipse...anyone taking it in August 21, 2017?

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DW and I are gonna fly a C172 from Wichita to the totality in northern KS, watch from the plane and fly back.
 
fjhill said:
DW and I are gonna fly a C172 from Wichita to the totality in northern KS, watch from the plane and fly back.
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They say traffic will be bad.......be careful up there.
 
I figure it's gonna be kinda like going to the Super Bowl... 

I went to Super Bowl 27,    I could have had a much better view of it watching TV.


BTW.    Do you think my old arc welding helmet with a #10 lens would work ?    8)
 
Local news (Eugene, OR) posts photos of 15 mile long traffic jam near Prineville.  And, it's only Thursday.  Gonna be crazy.
 
We will be closing the Visitor Center at Old Faithful along with my bookstore so everyone will be outside.  We are in the 98% area.  Debating whether or not to attempt to photograph it. 

Be safe, follow the guides on safe viewing.

 
TonyDtorch said:
I figure it's gonna be kinda like going to the Super Bowl... 

I went to Super Bowl 27,    I could have had a much better view of it watching TV.


BTW.    Do you think my old arc welding helmet with a #10 lens would work ?    8)
Click to expand...

It's been a lot of years ago, but I watched a partial eclipse back in the 80's with a welding helmet and if I'm remembering correctly (maybe....maybe not), I had a #9 lens in it.  If you are serious about doing that, just make sure that there are no scratches or any type of flaws that might allow the sunlight to go unfiltered.
 
A friend of ours is in the totality zone near Columbia, SC and invited us to join him. He called me though, to ask if I thought he should winterize his RV in case the temps dropped below freezing when the sun's heat was blocked. I asked him what happens when it's blocked every night, and he just said, "Oh... I didn't think of that!". :)

My wife and I discussed it long ago, and decided the 65-70% or so of it we'll see in the Adirondacks was enough for us instead of dealing with the traffic and crowds.
 
Oh great.  I just got an email from Amazon telling me not to use the solar eclipse glasses I bought from them several weeks ago.  They state they do not meet the NASA ISO specs.  Of course, there isn't a pair to be found at a store now and it's too late to order some more.
 
Tom and Margi said:
Local news (Eugene, OR) posts photos of 15 mile long traffic jam near Prineville.  And, it's only Thursday.  Gonna be crazy.
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Margi I am sorry I doubted you. I thought you were making a desperate attempt to keep the Californians away since I know how much Oregon hates California. I should have known you were honest. I found this clip in the news.

http://www.kgw.com/news/aerial-view-of-prineville-area-traffic-backup/465230379
 
Tom, that's happening anywhere near the full eclipse line -- Colorado is banning wide/oversized loads until two or three days after the eclipse, for fear of traffic problems. Wyoming is doing the same from Aug 20-22. The news is full of preps for the expected extra heavy traffic, including the highway patrol changing the distribution of their troopers to handle the expected traffic jams. It's being compared to a holiday weekend, only worse, even here in Colorado (Denver is in the 92% zone). And not just interstates -- U.S. and state highways are subject to the same problem. The news last night reported that one hotel in Casper (center of totality area) is getting $2500 for the night before the eclipse.

In other words, madness everywhere.
 
Supervisors supervisor came around yesterday and told us that the company execs decided to let workers clock out at 11:00 am Monday without having to use sick time or vacation.

I'm going to make a pinhole box this weekend, then clock out around 1:00~1:30 on Monday and go out to the parking lot to check out the sky show.
 
We are happily set up in a Forest Service campground in Idah, right in the totality area. However there are so many people expected the local farmers are advertising $200 dry camping spots. Everyone who doesn't want someone setting up in their fields have installed new barriers and brand new No Trespassing signs. We drove to town today to pick up some last minute items, and there was a steady stream of RV and tent campers headed into the mountains. We plan on staying put until Tuesday.
 
I know that Capn Morgan is basically at ground zero in Wyoming for this thing. hope he will get some nice pics.

We are going to be stuck at Loveland Lazy Days, this week, getting a rather nasty leak fixed in the Dancer's overcab.

 
The wife and I were planning on driving from Mama Gertie's in Swannanoa, NC to Creekside RV Park in Pigeon Forge on Monday. Because of the news indicating there will probably be massive traffic jams, even on the interstates on Monday, we have decided to leave tomorrow instead and hope that even leaving a day earlier, it won't be too long of a trip.
 
We're going to miss this one except for the 66% of it we'll see here in upstate NY. If we're here for the next one in 2024 though, we'll be in the 98.8% region.
 
There are four storms lined up in the Atlantic heading straight for North America. I really doubt we will have clear skies on the east coast. We have had cloudy skies for the last week here in central Florida. So I agree with the above poster, this is like the
Super Bowl so we are better off watching it at home. Especially considering the massive traffic jams being reported. It is 85% here and that is good enough if the skies clear.

https://www.accuweather.com/en/hurricane/atlantic
 
Tom and Margi said:
Local news (Eugene, OR) posts photos of 15 mile long traffic jam near Prineville.  And, it's only Thursday.  Gonna be crazy.
Click to expand...
the traffic jam near Prineville on US-26 was missleading.  There is a huge eclipse festival in the mountains SE of Prineville which started Thursday.  Probably 5000-10,000 people in attendance.  That is what caused the traffic jam.  At noon on Friday the traffic was flowing at about the speed limit.

I'm sure Monday morning will be a mad house of traffic though. 
 
We have been set up for about 11 days boondocking in the NF near John Day, OR. We are about 2-3 miles from the center of totality.  Weather is predicted to be clear for tomorrow. 

We downloaded the Global Observer app, associated with NASA, to take observations of temperature and cloud cover starting today and during the time around the eclipse. 

We should be one of many thousands taking observations for NASA so they will have detailed data associated with the eclipse. 
 
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