Page 28 - aruba-today-20170819

A28 SCIENCE
Saturday 19 auguSt 2017

Chasing eclipses across the globe is a way of life for some

By SETH BORENSTEIN choreographed how he
AP Science Writer was going to spend the
WASHINGTON (AP) — 2 minutes 53 seconds of
While Monday’s total solar darkness. Then came the
eclipse in the U.S. will be a moment.
once-in-a-lifetime sky show “I was frozen in place,” he
for millions, there’s a small recalled. “I had binoculars
group of people who have around my neck for two
experienced it all before and a half minutes and I
and they can’t get enough never picked them up.”
of it. When it was over “I was
Glenn Schneider has seen shaking. I was crying. I was
33. Fred Espenak has overwhelmed,” he said. “It
watched 28. Donald Li- was at that instant when I
ebenberg has logged 26. said ‘Yeah, this is what I’m
For newbie Kate Russo, it’s going to do with the rest of
10 and counting. my life’.”
These veteran eclipse Now Schneider takes his
chasers spend lots of mon- grown daughter with him
ey and craft intricate plans to eclipses. And he invent-
all to experience another ed what he calls the “lug-
mid-day darkening of the o-scope,” a telescope that
sky. Many work in science In this photo provided by Clemson University, Donald and Norma Liebenberg stand in the drive- folds into its own luggage
and related fields and way of their home in Salem, S.C., on Thursday, Aug. 17, 2017. to make his eclipse chas-
they’ll travel around the Associated Press ing easier.
world, even to Antarctica, lometer) path of totality avid eclipse watcher hus- phone app that times an “Flexibility is probably No.
to see one more. across the country, when band, Donald, in remote eclipse so photographers 1,” Schneider said. “Keep-
“I do this not so much as the moon moves between places like Libya, Zambia don’t miss anything. “It’s ing your options and open
an avocation, but as an Earth and the sun, block- and Western China. an adrenaline rush man, and be ready to take
addiction,” said Schneider, ing it for as much as 2 ½ “It’s sort of mind-boggling I’m telling you.” that option if that’s what’s
a University of Arizona as- minutes. It’s the first coast- that there are 1,000 peo- Telepun said his hero is “Mr. needed.”
tronomer Russo, a psychol- to-coast full eclipse since ple out in these isolated Eclipse” Espenak, a retired A veteran of 28 eclipses, Es-
ogist in Ireland who wrote 1918. Many of the big places to see it,” she said. NASA astrophysicist, who penak often leads groups
a book about people’s eclipse chasers are plan- She even forgave her hus- explains why chasers are of 50 some people to view
eclipse experiences, said ning to be in Oregon or band when he missed their the way they are. eclipses, lecturing both
some people find the ex- Wyoming because there’s first anniversary to go to a “It’s the closest any of us will about the beauty and the
perience life-changing. a better chance of clear clouded-out eclipse in the come to being an astro- science. Except when the
That happened to her. weather there in August. South Pacific. naut and being in space,” hour grows close and the
“Eclipse chasing isn’t just They’ll be ready to drive There’s a compulsiveness Espenak said. skies get dark, he goes si-
a hobby or interest,” Russo hundreds of miles if need to eclipse chasers, espe- Eclipse chasers say their first lent. “On eclipse day he’s
wrote in an email from Wy- be to find good weather. cially photographers, said always hooks them. all business. He does not
oming, where she traveled Total solar eclipses hap- Dr. Gordon Telepun, an Schneider, who got a tele- want to be diverted from
to see Monday’s eclipse. pen on average every Alabama plastic surgeon scope at age 5, planned his checklist of everything
“Eclipse chasing is a way 18 months or so, but they who has seen only three. out his first eclipse precise- he wants to do,” explains
of life. It becomes who you usually aren’t near easy- “It’s very anxiety produc- ly. He was 14 in 1970 and University of Tennessee’s
are.” to-drive highways. Norma ing, it’s very challeng- he traveled from New York Mark Littmann, co-author
Monday’s eclipse will cut Liebenberg has been to a ing,” said Telepun, who City to East Carolina Uni- with Espenak of the book
a 70-mile-wide (112 ki- dozen, mostly joining her even developed a talking versity’s stadium. He had “Totality.”q