April 8, 2024: Total Eclipse

The Fabulous 413

One would think that in a week were we had an unseasonably large nor’easter and an earthquake that we might be a little wary of finishing the time with a total solar eclipse. But it is also the last time this phenomena will be in New England until 2079 so there’s also little else we are thinking of, portents and precidents aside.

So Mr. Universe, Hampshire College’s Salman Hameed, clues us into some of the big discoveries in science that have only been possible due to research conducted in the small window of an eclipse, including Einstein’s theory of relativity, the discovery of helium, plus some of the things we might learn from the one happening today.

Word Nerd Emily Brewster, senior editor at Merriam Webster, brings us words adjacent to the eclipse, including some idioms related to the heavenly body, and also makes us a bit sad with the origins of the word itself.

And we get into a great resource for your kids to discover the occurrence as well. Lindsay Patterson and Marshall Escamilla found out all kinds of cool things about eclipses for their most recent episode of "Tumble: Science Podcast for Kids", including their song about it, and as a bonus hear about their upcoming episode about the confluence of Cicadas, another once in a lifetime event.

And Monte and Kaliis took the day to go to the path of totality themselves. It was a bit of an unexpected adventure, but was it worth it? Totally.