The Solar Eclipse Over Cleveland, a Reminder the Best Things in Life Are Free

Amateur astronomer Jay Ryan, 62, holds up a laminated copy of the Saros cycle, a chronology of every eclipse in recent millenia. Ryan’s been tapped by Cuyahoga County to help navigate a total eclipse task force. Credit: Photo by Mark Oprea

The long anticipated April 8th total eclipse of the sun is rapidly approaching. While many are excited, there are also many “eclipse skeptics.” Some are convinced – sight unseen – that the eclipse will be a “nothingburger,” failing to live up to the hype. They might have seen a partial solar eclipse back in third grade and considered that a “nothingburger,” not appreciating the enormous difference between a PARTIAL and a TOTAL solar eclipse. Others are devout weather pessimists, steadfast in their faith that a thunderstorm or blizzard awaits Cleveland on Eclipse Day. Still others are puzzled how anyone could get excited about something lasting not even four minutes.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the eclipse skeptics, there is an international cadre of “eclipse chasers” – people from every nation of the world who have witnessed a total solar eclipse, and the experience transformed their lives. They become umbraphiles, eagerly traversing the globe in search of additional encounters with the shadow of the moon.

During a total solar eclipse, the moon’s umbra sweeps across the Earth at over 2,000 miles per hour, plunging the landscape into darkness in the middle of the day. The sun’s corona is revealed, the ethereal solar atmosphere, invisible at all other times. This sight is so bizarre, so surreal, that it can have a profound emotional impact on many. Some are awestruck at this celestial spectacle outside their normal life experience. Others are humbled, feeling small amidst the immensity of the universe. Still others have an epiphany during those short minutes of totality, discovering a fresh perspective, a new understanding of things. In any case, the eclipse crowd is always wildly enthusiastic, and everyone is euphoric and exhilarated afterwards.

Do you suppose that maybe – just maybe – these seasoned veteran eclipse chasers know something that these uninitiated eclipse skeptics in Cleveland do not? Many eclipse chasers have seen dozens of total solar eclipses from far-flung locations all over planet Earth. What impels them? What drives them to such lengths? Clevelanders, including the skeptics, are about to find out on April 8.

A total solar eclipse is a very rare event, occurring in any given location about once every 343 years. But it’s a big planet with a lot of locations, and a total solar eclipse happens somewhere on the globe about every two years. Still, the 2024 eclipse is uncommon by total solar eclipse standards. There are always at least two solar eclipses each year, though most are unimpressive partial and annular types. Of the few that are total, most occur over the oceans, which cover 70% of the Earth’s surface. Of those that cross land, most pass over uninhabited territory, including jungles, deserts, and tundra. The 2024 eclipse is very rare in that much of its footprint is across North America and directly above 38 million Americans in several large American cities, including Akron, Cleveland, Dayton and Toledo.

Eclipse prediction is a very precise science, enabling the calculation of the occurrences and locations of eclipses forward and backward in time. Such calculations have been used by chronologers to find the dates of solar and eclipses reported in historical accounts, and thereby establish a timeline for all recorded history. It is also possible to accurately predict eclipses centuries in advance. Our upcoming 2024 eclipse has been anticipated for at least 137 years, documented in the Canon of Eclipses compiled by Theodor von Oppolzer in 1887.

Eclipse chasers tend to be affluent. Most total solar eclipses occur in far-flung corners of the globe such as Svalbard, Easter Island, Patagonia, and Australia. Eclipse chasers spend thousands of dollars traveling thousands of miles to arrive at their destinations, often taking a month off from work and their lives. Such travel can include expensive charter flights. Flights to some distant locales are pricey even if one is flying coach (and most umbraphiles do NOT fly coach!).

Eclipse excursions can entail a commercial flight to an international airport abroad, followed by a “puddle jumper” flight in a small plane to an isolated location. The intrepid umbraphile might then undertake a bumpy six-hour bus ride over unpaved, rutted back roads to arrive at the optimum observing spot. Along the way they can be attacked or robbed by local bandits or insurgent political factions. Eclipse chasing can be a serious “Indiana Jones” experience! All this for a two-minute eclipse that STILL might get clouded out!

There are more luxurious options. Tropical eclipse cruises are available starting at “only” $1,500 per person for “cheap seats” to view an eclipse. Such packages can cost up to a $12,000 per person for a deluxe suite. There was a total solar eclipse in 2016 in Ternate Island in Indonesia where a “friend of a friend” was reportedly invited to visit a well-known Big Tech billionaire aboard his 90-foot yacht. If you’d like to view an eclipse aboard a yacht of your own, they can be rented for a “mere” $21,000. All this for a two-minute eclipse that STILL might get clouded out!

Meanwhile, in Cleveland, Ohio, on Monday, April 8, 2024, all you need to do is step outside your door and view totality. The Eclipse Over Cleveland is the Blue Collar Eclipse, an unprecedented encounter with totality for working class Cleveland families on a budget. The eclipse skeptics should consider that the most amazing spectacle in the sky is coming to Cleveland free of charge! It will cost Clevelanders ZERO dollars, requiring ZERO miles of travel, and ZERO days off work. Even if the eclipse does turn out to be a “nothingburger” as the skeptics insist, you gotta admit that the price is right.

For anyone still unconvinced, just go outside at 3:00 PM on April 8. Take the Eclipse Over Cleveland 15-Minute Challenge! Rest assured that by 3:15 you will have seen something you never saw before, rain or shine! SO JUST DO IT! As said years ago by Hans & Franz on SNL, “Listen to me now and believe me later”!

And even if the devout weather pessimists get their wish for a cloudy Eclipse Day… there will STILL be an Eclipse Over Cleveland! As noted by an unidentified genius on social media, “A cloudy total solar eclipse is still more impressive than a sunny partial solar eclipse.” Wendy Gray, a Clevelander who witnessed a clouded-out total solar eclipse in 2017 from Hiawatha, Kansas, reported that the crowd STILL went wild as darkness descended upon the landscape. So if Cleveland weather gives us lemons, we can STILL go outside anyway and make lemonade!

But if we are blessed with a clear sky on Eclipse Day, a transformative experience might await Cleveland, Ohio. According to Webster’s, an epiphany is “a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something,” “an intuitive grasp of reality through something (such as an event) usually simple and striking,” or “an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure.” What good things might happen to Cleveland, Ohio if two million Greater Clevelanders all have an epiphany at the same time?

If you have the big bucks, maybe you’ll become an eclipse chaser yourself? The next total solar eclipse is in a remote area of Greenland in 2026. A more accessible eclipse awaits in Luxor, Egypt in 2027. The rest of us “blue collar umbraphiles” with no international travel budget will have to content ourselves with the memory of 2024 and await the next American total solar eclipses in 2044 and 2045.

There are as many different reactions to totality as there are different personalities. While some eclipse skeptics might have an epiphany, others might STILL regard it as a “nothingburger,” their skepticism validated. But they would probably also consider Niagara Falls or the Grand Canyon a “nothingburger”! Some, like me, might simply find totality to be the coolest thing they’ve ever seen. But even if you remain unmoved by the Eclipse Over Cleveland… hey, you get what you pay for!

Jay Ryan fondly remembers the early years of Scene as a music magazine during the “Cleveland Rocks” era of the 1970s. Jay is a former contributor to Sky &Telescope magazine and has been popularizing astronomy since 1996. Learn more from the pages and videos at EclipseOverCleveland.com.

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