Total Eclipse 2024
Some of you may have heard we had a total eclipse yesterday. I ventured up Owl’s Head in the Groton State Forest in Groton, Vermont to have a look. I was joined by 75 of my closest friends. The crowd was very friendly and I met lots of great people.
I was using my 400mm with a 1.4x extender with Thousand Oaks film solar filter. I used the timer on my phone to time the images, aiming for five minutes between shots. There is a fair bit of variation. I seriously misunderestimated how long it would take me to get the solar filter off and require the sun and failed to capture totality. I’ll be kicking myself for years…..
Sunspots are caused by intense magnetic flux (flowing liquid) pushing up from the Sun’s interior. This movement of flux creates magnetic fields roughly 2,500 times stronger than the Earth’s and interferes with the nominal convection on the Sun’s surface. This causes cooler areas – only about 7,000° F (normal is roughly 10,000°F). This causes the dark spots we can see on the Sun’s surface. Typical sunspots are roughly the size of the Earth.
I’ve got a great deal on some eclipse glasses for you……
Hope to see you all at one of the 11,897 eclipses we’ll have before 3,000 CE.
Loons should appear sometime in the next week. I’ll be checking regularly.
Thank you, Ian. You are great, and we love getting these photos
Thanks!
Hi Ian, I saw your Owl’s Head photo in the Journal Opinion I was so excited. You were in my neck of the woods, sort of. I think I may have mentioned in the NHSPA facebook group that I grew up in Groton, I know Owl’s Head pretty well, haven’t been up there in years though. I was actually in Cabot VT for the eclipse, it was totality there. I knew Groton wasn’t going to get full coverage so I went a short distance north, my dad still lives in Groton, so I was a little biff that the eclipse couldn’t be bothered to moved 20 minutes south ha. So Owl’s Head got full coverage? I knew parts of the State Forest was going to have totality I just didn’t know where exactly the boundary was. Great photos!