These are a few of many pictures my son Forrest took while watching the eclipse with Beth, myself, his wife Barb and daughter/granddaughter Renley. We travelled about 45 miles west to a small dam near Union City, where totality lasted just over 3 minutes...The clouds were threatening to obscure the view all morning, but the skies parted sufficiently in the afternoon to offer us fantastic viewing as the moon slowly covered the sun. As the corona revealed itself a phenomena called Bailys Beads appeared, which occurs as sunlight shines through craters and between mountains on the moon, then a thin red spectrum caused by hydrogen- called the chomoshere-became visible to the naked eye during totality. The drop in temperature as the sun became blocked was very noticable, as was the darkness as light was blocked. Watching a eclipse one becomes acutely aware of lifes total dependence on the sun, and how quickly the Earth would freeze were it to disappear; within months the ocean surface would freeze, as well as photsyntheisis stopping immediately,and most life, including humans would die within months to a year. Fortunately for those of us watching,the earth continued to rotate and the moons orbit continued, so light and warmth returned. Because of the present alighnment and relative sizes of the earth, moon and sun, total eclipses will only occur for another 500-600 millions years, and the next one in the USA will be in the year 2044.
