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The Solar Eclipse
by Aaron Turner - Monday, 21 August 2017, 10:51 PM
 

Those of us who didn't make it out of Connecticut for this event still had an interesting event to witness.  I set up the small telescope I use for solar observing, complete with a solar safe filter, and my camera with a zoom lens covered by one side of a pair of solar safe glasses.  The eclipse started right at 1:25, with some haze.  After the first 5 minutes things went downhill quickly - heavy haze, and then it became really difficult to find the sun in both the telescope and camera.  The solar observing glasses still showed the progress of the eclipse. 

Miraculously, at about 2:30, the skies quickly cleared, and I was able to shoot a few images leading up to the peak eclipse.  Finally I realized I was having focus problems, got a tight focus, and captured a reasonable set of images starting a few minutes after the peak.  Still nothing compared to what you can find on-line by now, I'm sure.

I spent the rest of the event at the telescope, put the camera on a timer, and enjoyed some more details that were visible only in the telescope.  The sun had a good set of sunspots today - I counted at least 4 large groups over the disk.  It was fascinating watching the Moon pass in front of each group, and then later having the groups pop out from behind the moon's disk as the eclipse waned.  I was also watching the very edge of the moon carefully, noting the irregularities caused by mountains and valleys along the limb. 

At the peak of the eclipse, for about 20 minutes, I noted that the loss of about 70% of the sunlight did cause the landscape around me to become noticeably dimmer, and in some ways "sharper".  Birds that constantly provide a background symphony in our yard went quiet.  Unfortunately, throughout this time I was also distracted by the escape of our dog, who tore through the neighborhood and woods over the next 45 minutes while all of my kids went out in a car hunting for him.  Too bad the eclipse didn't have a calming effect on him.

I've attached the best frame of the day, taken at 2:53pm, about 8 minutes past the peak.