Lynette Norris: Greene Publishing, Inc.
A solar eclipse happens somewhere in the world every 18 months. That's how long it takes for everything, from the moon's position relative to the sun and earth, to the phase of the moon, to the moon's distance from the earth, to swing into position like a dreamily choreographed ballet. What makes a solar eclipse so memorable is the rarity with which it occurs over the place where you happen to live, or can travel to – the earth is a pretty big place after all, and the path of total darkness is usually only a few dozen miles wide – and, at a time when the event is not obscured by cloud cover, as happened with the 1970 total eclipse that sped across Perry, the first municipality to experience the total darkness, and then up the eastern seaboard. Unfortunately, inclement weather prevented people here and along much of the East Coast from seeing the 1970 events in the sky.
Not so with Monday's eclipse. Monday’s eclipse covered all but a tiny sliver of the sun, and people looking up at the sky with eclipse glasses were able see the event in its entirety. The lucky ones were able to travel to the umbra zone, where the eclipse and the resulting darkness were total, but those who remained here were able to see a partial eclipse, and several expressed surprise that the streets never really got that dark, even with the sun almost entirely covered.
Greene Publishing, Inc. Publisher Emerald Greene Parsons snapped these cool photos of the eclipse, as it occurred, in 15-minute intervals.
For more eclipse coverage, and the local eclipse parties, be sure to snag a copy of this Friday's Madison Enterprise-Recorder.