Thats it? VERY DISAPPOINTED! I have encountered more darkness during severe thunderstorms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How many people here saw the eclipse IRL, in real time, per above?

:crickets:

I'm in Fairfax, so not 100% of the eclipse, but yes we watched it in real time. The sun was out at least half of the relevant 2 hours, including at the peak around 2:40. I'm glad we made the effort to see it. Also glad we did not travel out of state for it, but that's me.

[Anonymous]

Is there some reason everybody here is being party poopers? Is it just your default setting to go through life poo-pooing things or looking for only the negative side of an experience?

I have a picture of the sun through my glasses right around 2:42. In Vienna it wasn't behind clouds.

Around 2:30 maybe a little before after, the gnats came out in full force. It was insane. The eclipse looked pretty spectacular through the glasses and it was fun to do the projections on paper too.

I had friends who are down in South Carolina post pictures through your cameras. They all seemed really happy with their experience.

[Anonymous]

Wasn't pitch black here in Taccoa, Georgia (two minutes of totality). That being said, it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. The darkness escalated rapidly the last few minutes. It was eerie and dim, but the best was actually directly viewing the shadow of the moon during the safe period.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
That's why people made an effort to get to the path of totality. It gets pitch black and the stars come out, and animals get a little concerned.

I would have traveled if I could. The kids and I just went out to observe with our glasses and I explained that the sun is so powerful, even covered at more than 80%, it's practically broad daylight.

I'm in the totality path in OR right now. It did not get pitch black, maybe twilight dark. But you can only see the solar corona during totality; that's why you come to it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wasn't pitch black here in Taccoa, Georgia (two minutes of totality). That being said, it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. The darkness escalated rapidly the last few minutes. It was eerie and dim, but the best was actually directly viewing the shadow of the moon during the safe period.

I was at Tallula Gorge and agree, not absolute blackness but it was awfully dark. I think it's the full experience of it going from light to dark to light.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wasn't pitch black here in Taccoa, Georgia (two minutes of totality). That being said, it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. The darkness escalated rapidly the last few minutes. It was eerie and dim, but the best was actually directly viewing the shadow of the moon during the safe period.

I was at Tallula Gorge and agree, not absolute blackness but it was awfully dark. I think it's the full experience of it going from light to dark to light.

Could any of you see the stars?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
That's why people made an effort to get to the path of totality. It gets pitch black and the stars come out, and animals get a little concerned.

I would have traveled if I could. The kids and I just went out to observe with our glasses and I explained that the sun is so powerful, even covered at more than 80%, it's practically broad daylight.

I don't think it got pitch black. I haven't seen that online.

It did NOT get pitch black. I know people in the path of totality. They were not going crazy over what they saw - they expected more for making the trip (paying for airline tickets, etc.)

Good God, you people are ignorant.

[Anonymous]

I watched it near the WH with glasses. It was hot as hell and I felt no relief in the temperature or brightness. I was a little disappointed but I still want to travel to see totality in 2024!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wasn't pitch black here in Taccoa, Georgia (two minutes of totality). That being said, it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. The darkness escalated rapidly the last few minutes. It was eerie and dim, but the best was actually directly viewing the shadow of the moon during the safe period.

I was at Tallula Gorge and agree, not absolute blackness but it was awfully dark. I think it's the full experience of it going from light to dark to light.

I think that's part of it. My 3.5 yo DD had two things to say: 1) the sun (viewed through eclipse glasses) became a moon and then there was a circle and 2) it got darker and then it became morning again (we're in OR).

Not pitch black, but noticeably darker during totality, and noticeably warmer and brighter as soon as the tiniest bit of the solar disk re-emerged.

[Anonymous]

We are in Columbia SC. It got really dark during totality. The streetlights came on and the crickets started chirping. It also dropped about 15 degrees in 10 minutes. We stayed an extra few days after our beach vacation and it was totally worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wasn't pitch black here in Taccoa, Georgia (two minutes of totality). That being said, it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. The darkness escalated rapidly the last few minutes. It was eerie and dim, but the best was actually directly viewing the shadow of the moon during the safe period.

I was at Tallula Gorge and agree, not absolute blackness but it was awfully dark. I think it's the full experience of it going from light to dark to light.

Could any of you see the stars?

Just a few. But mainly because someone pointed them out.
You could see the brightest ones that were far from the sun. It was only a few minutes at totality, and the sun was the main show so I wasn't really looking. The sky looked more like twilight than night. The moons shadow was strikingly dark compared to the sky.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is there some reason everybody here is being party poopers? Is it just your default setting to go through life poo-pooing things or looking for only the negative side of an experience?

I have a picture of the sun through my glasses right around 2:42. In Vienna it wasn't behind clouds.

Around 2:30 maybe a little before after, the gnats came out in full force. It was insane. The eclipse looked pretty spectacular through the glasses and it was fun to do the projections on paper too.

I had friends who are down in South Carolina post pictures through your cameras. They all seemed really happy with their experience.

Debby Downers and otherwise miserable people who bitch about everything. I divorced one of those types.

[Anonymous]

I am sure I could see more darkness if I traveled to Kansas or Oklahoma during the tornado season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The sun was behind clouds at 2:42. My pinhole projector was working at 2:00, but showed nothing at the big moment. This was 90% hype and 10% actually something to look at in my neighborhood. My poor dd is very, very disappointed.

Why didn't you start watching before that?
It started an hour earlier, OP, and is still going on!

I'm not the OP, but I am the person you quoted. I didn't wait until 2:00 to start checking, I'm just saying that at 2:00 I got a good view with my pinhole projector, but since very shortly after that, the sun has been behind clouds and there has been nothing to see -- which is still the case. You can revel in the glory of your experience, but mine has been underwhelming.

[Anonymous]

There's a lot of weird people here. It's a natural phenomenon ... it's not in anyone's control how it will play out in front of you.