An Eclipse simulation program

On my solar eclipse links post at https://eclipse482024.blogspot.com/2023/08/eclipse-2024-links.html, I included a link to eclipse chaser Dan McGlaun’s site at https://eclipse2024.org/ 

There are a lot of great resources on this page, including a section that shows the times for the eclipse for many cities and towns in and outside of the path. There are also resources for events happening in various cities and towns (but it may not list everything)

Another very good feature of the site is the eclipse simulator.

Here is the direct link for the 2024 eclipse: 


You can zoom in on the map and click on a location. There is also a search feature. But if you choose the name of a town, it’s going to show you the simulation from the center of town. 

Once you launch the eclipse simulator, here are some useful tips: 

This does work better on a computer, but it still can be done on the phone.

There is an instructions link; click that to learn more. There is a small i with a circle around it next to each section of the page; click that to learn more as well. 

There is a zoom feature. It’s visible as a red line on the left side on a computer. I could not find the red line on my phone, but I was able to zoom using my fingers.

You can keep the view set to wide angle to get an estimation of how the light level drops. If you click the “study shadow” box it shows you the location of the Moon's shadow in the sky at the time. 

If you click the box labeled “Study Baily’s Beads” and zoom in a bit, that shows you an estimation of how long the Baily’s Beads will last before and after totality. It will also show you the thin red line of the chromosphere so you can see how long it is estimated to last from the site that you have selected. Note that the Beads and chromosphere are visible at the beginning and end of totality, as you have hopefully seen in some of my other posts. You can also see how the view of the Beads and chromosphere increase noticeably as you get closer to the edge of the path.

Please note that clicking on the “Study Baily’s Beads” feature does hide the corona. You can see the corona by deselecting this box. 

Play around with this simulator. It’s very impressive to use, and quite a bit of effort and calculations went into it.

But nothing compares to the real thing!


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