Photo via Time Out Montreal
Next week, on August 12th, we will be witnessing a total solar eclipse. It will be visible in Greenland, Iceland, northern Spain, and small parts of Portugal and Russia.
Here in Canada, we had
‘our own’ solar eclipse that took place on April 8, 2024. For that occasion, many
public events were organized. Jeremy
Hansen, Canadian Space Agency astronaut and Artemis II mission specialist, was
present in Niagara Falls (both on the Ontario and New York sides) from April 6
to 8, 2024 and Canadian Space Agency astronaut David Saint-Jacques was present
at Parc Jean-Drapeau here in Montréal. What a truly historic event it was.
According to https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/in/canada/montreal?iso=20240408
“The total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, in Montréal lasted for 2
hours and 22 minutes, with the period of complete darkness (totality) lasting 1
minute and 28 seconds at its peak. Eclipse Timeline began at 2:14 pm its
maximum totality: 3:27 PM and it ended: 4:36 pm”
Radio- Canada gave us
a link to 1932 Total eclipse Montreal archives https://www.facebook.com/ArchivesMontreal/posts/pfbid0mPtwaaKwJgsDspYgMdNjgn7CSXPrdNbyVHL1UFK4crECPNkZX85mScuY9iFMpEqUl
Members of Montreal
Facebook group “Montreal Then and Now” took so many beautiful solar eclipse photos.
If you have a chance, refer to that group (year 2024, April 8). Cover photo
above was taken by Time Out Montreal.
What was special about this total eclipse is that a few days prior to it, on April 4th, Montréal received a massive spring snow storm that left around 25 cm of snow. Fortunately, on April 8th we had 20°C, snow melted, and it was a beautiful sunny day.
For the eclipse, originally,
I planned to go to McGill, visit the Trottier Space observatory, and then watch
the eclipse with the crowd on the main campus. As a good sociologist, I wanted
to observe how do we as a crowd behave before, during, and after the eclipse. Unfortunately, my potential study was impossible
as some work kept me that day and I had to stay home.
What was left for me was
to sit on my balcony, projected with a ‘panorama view’ of the main street in
front of me, and to wait patiently for the sun to be eclipsed. I managed to wave to
my neighbors. They were already a few hours early on their balconies with their
solar glasses and a music on.
But what a view, and what a feeling it was once the total eclipse arrived! Sun was covered in its totality. It was dark. It was, surreal. A real night, during the day. I started filming as I wanted a “souvenir” for myself to keep as a memory. I moved my phone around, but not in the direction of our eclipsed sun, and while filming I realized that a city bus was dragged by another camion that was helping him move. What a scene it was: A solar eclipse above us and a bus slowly moving in this total darkness waiting for the light to come back so it can advance. A rare event in even rarer time.
Three videos I
managed to film, from my archives:
Video 1, during solar
eclipse:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/5nnWcdc7nro
Video 2, during solar eclipse with our city bus
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/yySGKqP3a-E
and Video 3, after solar eclipse
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/c0IBs06k-dU
I am eagerly looking forward to August 12th total solar eclipse.
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