When will the total solar eclipse occur, and how long will it last? You may also want to attend one of the many eclipse parties and organized events taking place around the path of totality. You can also check out our state-by-state guide to find out which major cities and prime locations will fall inside the path of totality. You can use this interactive map from NASA to zoom in on the path and find out the exact locations from which it will be visible. It passes through Idaho, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina. 21, 2017, total solar eclipse is about 70 miles wide and stretches from Oregon to South Carolina. Where will the total solar eclipse be visible? These effects are not visible during a partial solar eclipse, so skywatchers are encouraged to see if they are inside the path of totality during the total eclipse. Just before and just after totality, observers can see this cloak of darkness moving toward them across the landscape, and then moving away. "It makes people's jaw drop."ĭuring totality, the area inside the moon's shadow is cloaked in twilight - a very strange feeling to experience in the middle of the day. "It brings people to tears," Rick Fienberg, a spokesperson for the American Astronomical Society (AAS), told of the experience. The corona is far from an indistinct haze skywatchers report seeing great jets and ribbons of light, twisting and curling out into the sky. What will I see during a total solar eclipse?ĭuring a total solar eclipse, the disk of the moon blocks out the last sliver of light from the sun, and the sun's outer atmosphere, the corona, becomes visible. Two to five solar eclipses occur each year on average, but total solar eclipses happen just once every 18 months or so.
and other nearby areas will see a partial solar eclipse, in which the moon appears to take a bite out of the sun's disk. Outside the path of totality, skywatchers in the continental U.S. However, these heavenly bodies line up only about once every 18 months. The moon orbits an average of 239,000 miles (385,000 kilometers) from Earth - just the right distance to seem the same size in the sky as the much-larger sun. The fact that total solar eclipses occur at all is a quirk of cosmic geometry. A total solar eclipse occurs when the disk of the moon appears to completely cover the disk of the sun in the sky.