2017-08-21

On August 21st, 2917 a total solar eclipse will be visible across a narrow path from coast to coast. It will be at about 10AM PDT, 11AM MDT, 12PM CDT, and 1PM EDT (it only takes 1 minute to cross from coast to coast!).


( click for a much better interactive map.... )

While the whole nation will get some sort of partial eclipse, you MUST be in that dark band, and ideally closer to the middle than the edges of the band. On/near the center line in Oregon, totality will be 2.0+ minutes. in Missouri/Kentucky, it will peak at 2 minutes 40 seconds, but its much more likely to be cloudy than it is in parts of Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming.

This is a once in a life time event. On the day of the eclipse, I suspect a gajillion people will logjam every road within 100 miles... best to be there a couple days early and setup a base camp to hang out at.

I want my wife to enjoy this with me, so I've pre-paid a premium for a 5 day full hookup RV space in the Jefferson County fairground in Madras, OR, they are organizing a Solar Festival for the whole weekend, with NASA speakers, some kinda music, food booths, etc. at this site, totality will be a full 2 minutes. it has the best probabilities of clear weather on that date based on historical weather date of anywhere on the entire path.

we'll be in our new Casita I'm going to bring a telescope so we can observe the night skies from the lawn next to our reserved space... even in the middle of the fairgrounds, it will be nice if it was fairly dark as the skies in that part of the state are quite dark.




I've been told that hotels and stuff in every town along the totality is booking up fast.


If it was just me, I was thinking of dry camping on some BLM land thats like 30-40 miles east of Madras, and even better probability of clear, you can camp most anywhere along the John Day River just north of Mitchell, OR, that should be good and clear.

 

useful eclipse links.
interactive map of the eclipse. zoom in, click on any spot to see the timing details.
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEgoogle/SEgoogle2001/SE2017Aug21Tgoogle.html

Eclipsophile:
http://eclipsophile.com/total-solar-eclipses/total-solar-eclipse-2017-august-21/
(some great weather information on the 'overview' page)