Live data from Hacker News

Travel the path of the solar eclipse

washingtonpost.com

51–60 of 74 posts

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#51
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how appropriate is it for us to park in 'some random place' for a couple of days somewhere up there? Public lands have certain areas you can disperse camp. Other than that it is usually not ok to just random camp. These won't be ordinary times though. I'd _expect_ people will be looking the other way or be too busy to worry about running off RV's in parking lots. We are planning on find a spot in Idaho a week and a…

> Public lands have certain areas you can disperse camp. Other than that it is usually not ok to just random camp. Definitely understood! There is, apparently, quite a lot of public land in eastern Oregon. I was thinking about the Unity area, give or take.

I'm not super familiar with Unity, but based on the satellite photos, I think Forrest Road 6015 will be traversable with a Class C; you should be able to find a fine place to came out there. You should call up the Prairie City Ranger District too, they'll know more local specifics than anything you can find online.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#52
post #31

They should have mentioned which of the listed places have an airport that is served by one or more major airlines. Those places provide the opportunity of simply flying in, hanging out at the airport until the eclipse and watching from there, and then flying home. I checked a few, looking for round trip flights from Seattle leaving Seattle the day before and returning the day of the eclipse. For some it may be possi…

If you're actually interested in doing this from Seattle, it looks like Alaska has nonstop flights from Seattle to Charleston, SC and Kansas City. Greenville-Spartanburg, SC (GSP) is another candidate although a bit harder to get to.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#53

I started a group with a long shot dream that some day total solar eclipses will be properly celebrated in the form of giant high tech festivals http://shadow.dance . But in addition to celebration, they are opportunities for somber reflection on history. Any arbitrary long path anywhere on earth will include historic sites that reveal depressingly dark human behavior but the Aug 21 path is remarkable in that it incl…

> the Aug 21 path is remarkable in that it includes the most important historic sites for almost all the dark aspects of US history

It really isn't, and it really doesn't. It doesn't cross Dresden or Nagasaki or My Lai or Guantanamo. It crosses a lot of sites of historical political and military domestic engagements in the USA, all of which are sad for the losing side, because it crosses a large cross section of the US.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#54
post #32
post #25

> Unfortunately for residents of Oregon’s historically cloudy coast, NOAA scientists have calculated the chances of a clear day at about 44 percent. ... > A few hours east, however, the odds increase dramatically. Because the Cascade Range creates a significant rain shadow across central and eastern Oregon, chances are high that the view will be unobstructed. How good are the short term forecasts for Oregon? If the d…

In Eastern Oregon, summer weather is either clear or thunderstorms; thunderstorms develop in the afternoon, while the eclipse is in the morning. You're exceptionally likely to get a clear day East of the Cascades. I leave in rural Eastern Oregon. The population here is expected to swell by a factor of 5-10x during the eclipse, and this is expected to overwhelm local services. If you're headed to rural Oregon -- or pr…

I can confirm that EMS/LE services will be very busy. I know some people in the local ham group there who are helping and it sounds like it's going to be pretty crazy.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#55
post #31

They should have mentioned which of the listed places have an airport that is served by one or more major airlines. Those places provide the opportunity of simply flying in, hanging out at the airport until the eclipse and watching from there, and then flying home. I checked a few, looking for round trip flights from Seattle leaving Seattle the day before and returning the day of the eclipse. For some it may be possi…

St. Louis is a good hub near the eclipse track. You can rent a cheap car and head right into the New Madrid Seismic Zone to watch the eclipse from scenic Chester, IL! http://www.idlewords.com/2015/07/confronting_new_madrid.htm

Will you be able to rent a cheap car, though? I'd expect that rental cars are going to be like hotels--greatly jacked up in price on rental periods that include the eclipse, if any are even still available.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My summary is oversimplified but if you look at the legend on the map it indicates that the prisoners at the camp were forced to build the Minidoka Irrigation Project which crosses the shadow path from the south where the Camp was located and extends north of it. So the Camp is tied into the shadow path which in the original vision would have been noted by a monument on the path. It was surprisingly easy (by going to…

Out of curiosity, is there a reason you've chosen to focus on "dark" events in the path? Is it because of the shadow metaphor? I'm sure there are plenty of good things that happened in the path too.

The Trail of Tears and Sullivan's island leapt out at me the very first time I saw a map of the shadow path and I have for years thought that an honest painful day of atonement around the world would be healing and humbling and a good antidote to romanticized militarism. Only Germany has come close to real atonement. Most of the rest of the world is way overdue. So I thought it would be a valuable addition to a day that bonds a nation with many of the best activities for creating harmony - dancing, cheering, working and eating together rounded out with crying together and promising never again together. Many of my thoughts are in the proposal which is way long as the event is complicated. But I have run a camp at Burning Man I have been to the Virgin of Guadalupe Festivities, and past a critical point adding events and complexity really does create an unstoppable frenzy that is more and more likely to succeed and pretty soon you can't keep people away.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My summary is oversimplified but if you look at the legend on the map it indicates that the prisoners at the camp were forced to build the Minidoka Irrigation Project which crosses the shadow path from the south where the Camp was located and extends north of it. So the Camp is tied into the shadow path which in the original vision would have been noted by a monument on the path. It was surprisingly easy (by going to…

Out of curiosity, is there a reason you've chosen to focus on "dark" events in the path? Is it because of the shadow metaphor? I'm sure there are plenty of good things that happened in the path too.

[deleted]

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#58

I love North America! I feel privileged to live here and have access to the Interstate System to travel across such varied topology.

The governments of the countries built them.

Engineering solved the issues of building roads over varied terrain efficiently.

You should give back instead of just "feeling privileged".

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#59
post #53

I started a group with a long shot dream that some day total solar eclipses will be properly celebrated in the form of giant high tech festivals http://shadow.dance . But in addition to celebration, they are opportunities for somber reflection on history. Any arbitrary long path anywhere on earth will include historic sites that reveal depressingly dark human behavior but the Aug 21 path is remarkable in that it incl…

> the Aug 21 path is remarkable in that it includes the most important historic sites for almost all the dark aspects of US history It really isn't, and it really doesn't. It doesn't cross Dresden or Nagasaki or My Lai or Guantanamo. It crosses a lot of sites of historical political and military domestic engagements in the USA, all of which are sad for the losing side, because it crosses a large cross section of the…

I should have said domestic history. The proposal briefly mentions inviting the creation of monuments to international suffering. See more comments below.

Re: Travel the path of the solar eclipse

#60

I started a group with a long shot dream that some day total solar eclipses will be properly celebrated in the form of giant high tech festivals http://shadow.dance . But in addition to celebration, they are opportunities for somber reflection on history. Any arbitrary long path anywhere on earth will include historic sites that reveal depressingly dark human behavior but the Aug 21 path is remarkable in that it incl…

I may just be a bit thick, but what's the significance of Aug 21 in this? (In plain terms, if you can.) Just for context: I have actually observed a total Solar eclipse, and while it was pretty significant and "awesome" in confirming my (philosophical term:) belief in Science[1], it -- in no way -- implied much else. [1] It was predicted at least 2 years in advance... which is astounding given the speed at which the…

Actually, it was predicted a lot further in advance than that. The Canon der Finsternisse [1] published in 1887 shows the predicted track of the upcoming 2017 eclipse [2]. I think I read once that the author, Theodor Ritter von Oppolzer, only calculated the start, middle, and end points of each eclipse, which is why the track in [2] is a bit off.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_of_Eclipses

[2] http://eclipse-maps.com/Eclipse-Maps/History/History_files/C...

Post reply on HN