8/28 lunar eclipse at Chabot

by Michael Swartz

I would bet that most of you were outside last night at some point watching the eclipse.

I took my family up to Chabot space and science center in Oakland. We got there just before midnight. I only took my binoculars because I was definitely in tourist mode.

We bought our tickets, entered the main entrance and started checking out the exhibits. The kids really like running through this little tunnel which was supposed to represent a "black hole". But they made so much noise that I had to make them stop. There were some interesting displays showing various nebula, galaxies and even an electric 3-d model of a section of space. The display had several buttons which when pressed would show the location of several of our local stars. It was an interesting perspective. There was also a display that showed the life and death of a star.

There was a desk set up out in the main entrance hall where kids could cut out paper and make a sky wheel. it only had maybe 20 constellations on it but it was fun. They charged $2.50 for a cup of coffee which made my wife mad but she drank it anyway. The kids really loved climbing in the replica of the mercury module and they liked playing the lunar lander game. Finally there was a big room with a model of the solar system along the ceiling and a number of hands-on exhibits which let the kids play with things like making a vortex, making craters, causing pressure to make a volcano or rolling marbles in a funnel like thing so they could see how gravity makes things go down. It also reminded me of how a black hole might look if we could see it. They also had big glass balls with some kind of gas or projection of some kind in them that showed the storm systems on different planets.

Outside only the small refractor was in operation; "Leah". And of course, it was pointed at the moon. There was also a wide selection of small telescopes and binoculars owned and operated by amateur astronomers scattered around the courtyard area between the observatory domes, all pointed at the moon. The largest was a 12" (I think) dob which could have been an Obsession. I held my hand out from the eyepiece and saw the light from the moon on the palm of my hand. I swear I could almost see the craters on my hand. Talk about eyepiece projection! There were also people sort of camped around in/on sleeping bags, folding chairs, etc.. which made it a little difficult to walk around. Then some news station started filming a presentation done by a guy in a wizard costume. He did a wonderful verbal tour of the sky, pointed out a few major stars and things with a green laser which was barely visible under the moonlight, talked about the observatories and telescopes housed in them and what the eclipse actually meant. It was quite interesting.

I couldn't quite get my kids to catch the significance of what was happening because they really just wanted to play with the hands-on exhibits in the big solar system room just inside from the observation area. So my wife and I stood outside the door watching the eclipse progress using my Canon 18x50-IS binoculars. There we could watch the moon, see the observing activities in the observation courtyard, and still see our children. The view of the moon was just stunning through the Canon 18x50-IS binos. The colors of brown, orange, red, grey, black and white were so vivid and beautiful with the rough and jagged lunar landscape in the background which as all just like a cut out against a very black sky (compared to the brightness of the moon anyway).

As the moon was entering the inner shadow it was remarkable to see the three phases of the eclipse all at once. There was the reddish/brown color cast in the inner shadow, the dark grey shadow of the outer shadow and then of course the bright white part which was illuminated by the sun. And as the moon continued to move into the inner shadow the red/brown color overtook the grey and white parts until all that was left was the red/brown, a little dark grey, and a sliver of white and then totality. Wow! It was beautiful. The totality was actually greeted by applause by the observers out on the observation courtyard. As my wife and I looked at the moon colored that strange red/brown through my binoculars, we wondered and admired the strange colors as it was illuminated by the light of a thousand sunsets and a thousand sunrises. Kind of romantic in a way. If one were to be sitting on the moon watching the earth eclipse the sun I imagine that it would be very beautiful to see the ring of red/brown/orange colors which would surround the earth. How strange that would be.

When I couldn't endure it any more, we fetched our kids and went home. I was only able to see the first half. From a practical matter, the second half is the same as the first but in reverse. So I wasn't really disappointed. I would have enjoyed watching it but I needed to get my family home and I knew that I would really be hurting at work if I didn't at least get a few hours of sleep. Morning came way too quickly but I'm very glad that we went.

I hope you enjoyed it too.

Michael Swartz