Lecture & Stargazing: Great American Eclipse Preparation

Tonight we hosted a lecture by Dr. Erika Hamden, who described how to prepare for the Great American Eclipse.  The Great American Eclipse is a total solar eclipse set to occur next August, where the center line (the strip where the total eclipse will be visible) will stretch across the continental United States.  Erika gave some background on eclipses, what causes them, and what you can see when they happen.  She detailed her experiences having seen one in China in 2008, and pressured everyone to get to somewhere on the center line next summer to catch this one-in-a-lifetime opportunity!

All photographs were taken by Christophe Marcade.

After her lecture, we had a Q&A panel with our local experts answering questions on all sorts of topics ranging from future rocket engine drives to the most interesting and underrated discoveries in the field of astronomy in the last year.

Due to the proximity to Halloween, we invited guests and volunteers alike to show up in their costumes.  I brought Oscar the Grouch along, and several of the attendees showed up in costumes.

Observations went well, and we saw several targets including the first-quarter moon, Mars, and the Double Cluster before the end of the night.  See you again next month!

--Cameron