LENS ATOMS STUDIOS

THE ECLIPSE ADVENTURE CONTINUES: STAYING SUNNY IN TUCSON, AZ.

8/7/2016

It seems the eclipse is the gift that keeps giving. After coming home and writing about my eclipse adventure, I was contacted by Matt Penn, the lead investigator of the Citizen CATE project. You can find more information on the experiment here: https://citizencate.org The project is still seeking donors and decided to make a Kickstarter video to aid in gathering funds. So Caitlin and I flew down to the National Solar Observatory to get the footage.

Currently, Research Experience For Undergraduates (REU) students are spending the summer at the NSO in Tucson. They are analyzing data from telescope tests done in Indonesia during the 2016 total solar eclipse in Indonesia and preparing for the 2017 total solar eclipse. Sarah Kovac is the student representative from Southern Illinois University Carbondale attending the research experience. Bob Baer and Sarah will then lead the Illinois telescope groups which hopefully will include me and my students at Gallatin County if there is enough funding for us to be volunteers! Read more about Bob and Sarah’s 2016 eclipse experience here.

July 25th was our travel day. After delays in both Evansville and Dallas we arrived in Tucson pretty late in the night, late enough we were left with the last rental car, free upgrade! The next morning after having breakfast we arrived at the NSO. We set up in our office for the next couple of days to get started on the work for the week: the promotional video and final student presentations.

After finishing our day filming at Cienega High School, we noticed a storm coming towards us. It turns out we were visiting during the monsoon season, which I didn’t even know Tucson had a monsoon season. The southwest landscape with a backdrop of the rains rolling towards us really brought out some beautiful light and colors. We finished the night walking around the campus of the University of Arizona and exploring food options.

Our shooting schedule for the second day gave us some time to do some sight seeing. With our short trip, we had to make a choice, Biosphere 2 or Kitt Peak. I really wanted to see Biosphere 2 but considering the nature of our trip and the potential closing of the McMath-Pierce Telescope (the largest solar telescope in the world), we decided to visit Kitt Peak. After our tour we headed back to the NSO for the first round of student presentations.

That night, Ha Kin, who had been working in LA for the past couple of months, flew in to Tucson to catch up. According to Ha Kin, she has a certain kind of luck, where situations turn complicated but eventually work out in the end, much like the situation we found ourselves in at her hotel. After over an hour, the hotel couldn’t find any record of her having reservations, she did and we had all the paperwork. But finally, she was able to check in and rest.

Our last day in town we decided to go to the downtown area before the last set of student presentations. I usually like to take a long walk around to really see a place versus driving and missing everything and everyone. I love the heat and never mind being hot but in less than an hour we needed to find water fast!

We finished the afternoon at the NSO filming the final student presentations. We packed up our equipment and headed directly next door to the Steward Observatory to talk to Dr. Glenn Schneider who was instrumental in the planning of the eclipse flight I was on back in March. After watching the interview, I feel confident to move forward with a full length documentary about the eclipse.

When we walked around town earlier that day, we noticed a tall hill with an “A” on it that seemed close by and would have a cool vantage point for viewing the rains. Sentinel Peak Park turned out to be one of my favorite memories of Tucson. I shot most of the scenes for my "Tucson Skies" video there. After hiking around, we started seeing lightning just as the sun was also setting. Floods of cars and cameras came up to the peak to get shots of the storm.

The next morning we said goodbye to Ha Kin and prepared for our flight. But the monsoons would cause our flight to be cancelled giving us an extra day with no work in the schedule. Biosphere 2 was now on! I had read about it when I was younger, or was probably read to, considering I remember learning about it in first grade, when the first mission took place. It is now operated by University of Arizona and if you are on the fence about climate disruption, then this is a place to see the evidence. The tour did not disappoint and Caitlin and I made a short educational video. Biosphere 2 goes on my list as the number 1 dream field trip.

With the 2017 eclipse still ahead I’m looking forward to more possibilities and opportunities that may arise.

Clear skies!

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From Alaska to Hawaii: My adventure on Alaska Airlines flight 870 and the Eclipse.

3/14/2016

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On January 29th, I attended the Science in the South Conference hosted by my alma mater Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. The conference, for local science educators, offers a series of workshops on current trends, topics, and technology in science. This year, the upcoming 2017 eclipse was the highlight of the conference. Full disclosure: I wasn’t aware of an upcoming eclipse that would engulf my hometown in its shadow.

I decided I would finally attend an eclipse workshop to finish out the day. The session was about the Citizen CATE experiment, the goal of which is to make a continuous 90 minute movie of the solar corona during the 2017 total solar eclipse. You can read more here. The workshop was full of professional and amateur astronomers, and me, the lady that was totally oblivious to this whole thing. After the session, I realized how big this event was going to be for Southern Illinois, Carbondale, and our little school in Gallatin County. I wanted to be involved.

A couple of days after the conference, I contacted the presenter of the workshop, Bob Baer the computer/electronics specialists in the Physics Department and the Illinois State Coordinator for the Citizen CATE project. I wanted to be a part of this. I told him of my teaching position at Gallatin County and that I was also a filmmaker; my being a filmmaker sparked his interest.

On Febuarary 22, I stopped by SIU to film a meeting for the Citizen CATE experiment. Bob and the lead student on the CATE project, Sarah Kovac, would be leaving soon for Indonesia, and I wanted to make sure I got their pre-trip feelings captured on video. Sarah decided to take my Go Pro along for the trip, since I wouldn’t be able to join them.

The next day, Bob emailed me expressing his thanks for filming the meeting. He also mentioned a commercial flight that would intercept the March 8th/9th eclipse and introduced me to Mike Kentrianakis, the Solar Eclipse Project Manger at the American Astronomical Society who was part of the keynote address at Science in the South. Mike immediately contacted me and sold me on the idea of filming from the plane, the only way to even see the eclipse outside of Indonesia. This was possibly a once-in-a-lifetime trip he told me. I told him I was in but two days later, before I had bought my ticket, the plane had sold out. Mike suggested calling the airlines twice a day, maybe there would be a cancellation.

On March 3rd, I noticed a seat had opened and I booked immediately. The only problem was, it was a middle seat, not the starboard window seat I needed to get the best view. But it was only a seat away to where I needed to be, so it would do. With only five days left before the eclipse, I booked my hotels in both Anchorage and Honolulu, made arrangements at the school, and on March 6th I left Evansville Airport for a connecting flight to Chicago that would then take me to Anchorage Alaska. On the flights over I realized two things: I had to get that window seat somehow and I had to have access to my equipment; not so easy in the tight spaces in coach.

I arrived at my hotel in Anchorage around 12 am Alaska Standard Time. It was too dark to see much; I could only see the evergreen trees and the old dirty snow left on the ground. By morning, I woke up with a beautiful view of the mountains that had been hidden the night before. Looking out my window, I could see ice on the sidewalks, not the walking friendly city I was hoping for since I didn’t get a rental car.

My hotel shuttled me downtown where I spent the morning and afternoon walking around and purchasing last minute camera equipment I needed for the flight. At 3 pm, I went back to the hotel to meet Dan McGlaun who would be on the flight with me. Dan would be the first “eclipse chaser” or “umbraphile” I would meet on the trip. He agreed to a chilly interview in the Alaskan cold where he informed me of his past eclipse experiences. What I would soon realize is chasing an eclipse is a lot of work. It involves physics, analyzing weather patterns, having backup plans, maybe chartering a plane, and in our case, calling the airline to have them reroute and delay a commercial flight.

Going over the next day's plans with Captain Hal Andersen.

Gloves, beanie, coffee, and camera essentials for a cold Alaskan interview.

Dan McGlaun being a sport out in the cold.

After the interview, I prepared for the evening where I would meet all the other chasers on the flight. I was picked up by Mike, finally meeting him in person and we left for Simon and Seaforts for dinner. Our pilots, Captains Hal Andersen and Brian Holm, agreed to eat with us and celebrate. It was a whirlwind of who’s who of eclipse chasers, fascinating globe trotting stories, and the science behind a topic that I would soon realize I had just begun to understand. I now felt the enormity of the event that I was flying towards. Two hours later, full from the fresh fish, everyone parted ways, excited about the day to come.

The next day, I awoke without an alarm, eager to get out the door and to the airport. I still needed that starboard window seat. I checked in and shockingly, the seat right next to mine had opened up. It was one of two seats available but it was the only one that had the starboard window that I desperately needed. It was such a relief knowing the window was mine; I immediately felt the stress melt away, if the plane would hit its the target, I would see it. I made my way to the gate realizing I was the first one there. One-by-one the eclipse enthusiasts made their way in.

The press was scheduled to arrive at the gate at noon. At first, one cameraman and a reporter were there (they would join us on the flight), but in just thirty minutes our gate was full of reporters and cameras. People waiting at other gates approached me asking what was going on and were disappointed when they found out that only our flight would see the eclipse. Our group of 13 chasers, plus a handful more, were the only passengers that knew what they were about to see. The other hundred passengers of flight 870 were just looking to take a break from the cold in Alaska, they were in for an extra treat.

Me putting up the Go Pro. Thanks Mike Kentrianakis for the picture!

The eclipse group boarded the plane first, giving us a little time to set up. I was relieved to see that I had more room on this flight, and having access to my equipment wouldn’t be a problem. As the passengers starting filing in, I heard my name over the PA: I was needed up front. I made my way against the people coming in, upstream, just like the salmon I had enjoyed the night before. I was asked to set up a Go Pro in the cockpit, something that I will not so humbly admit, was pretty cool. The flight staff were great and they continued to go out of their way to accommodate us. I settled in; the party wouldn’t start until halfway through the flight.

Around 4:30 pm, 2 and a half hours into the flight, the eclipse began. Without the special glasses, the sun looked like it would on any other day. My comrades in the front of the plane played Bonnie Taylor’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart” (GMA would do the same when covering the story). Even with just a tiny sliver of the sun visible, it was still too bright to look at without the glasses. Then, at about 5:35 pm, totality began. We were flying 500 mph at 35,000 ft in the air and we were right on target. We removed our glasses, now totally safe to do so. People from the left side of the plane tried to squeeze in for a glimpse. My row mate and a lady from the front left of the plane sat in the floor to get a decent view.

People can describe what an eclipse looks like, you can get a general idea, but you won’t know just what it feels like until you are there. The term "amazing" is thrown around too much, but this is when it truly applies. A couple of chasers told me before that it brings out a primal fear, when day oddly turns to night. The cabin wasn’t just filled with “ah’s" and “oh’s," it was full of yips, clapping, “oh my gods,” and maybe a few explicits. It’s hard to say what brought on the excitement I felt, the camaraderie brought on from the fact that we were some of the few people to get to see this, the pressure to get the shot, or the amazement at the sight of something I had never witnessed with my own two eyes. In just two short minutes, it was over.

I would later ask Evan Zucker, one of the chasers, if eclipse chasing had its superstitions. “Not superstitions but it is full of traditions,” he said. Just as the show in the sky ended, the traditions began. “Here Comes the Sun” by the Beatles was played, the eclipse flag was paraded down the aisle by Craig and Dan, and when we landed we would celebrate with Egg Creams, a beverage consisting of milk, carbonated water, and chocolate syrup.

Craig and Dan parade the flag after the eclipse.

Evan Zucker speaks with the pilot about the view from the cockpit.

As we pulled up to the gate in Honolulu, I spotted a camera crew as they were filming us. I was one of the last ones off the plane, making sure to collect all my gear. As we stepped off the plane, we were greeted by the camera crew, who we later found out was getting footage for Good Morning America (watch the video here). Mike, Bob, Anisa, and I left the group to head to the

basement of the Alaska Airlines office. After an hour of collecting our footage, we were finally able to leave the airport for our separate destinations around Honolulu. That hour of transferring was worth it though. The next day, Mike’s video went viral. As I’m typing this, it currently has over a million views on youtube (watch it here).

Such a lovely spot for an interview.

Evan Zucker relives the moment.

I took another day to enjoy Honolulu and to relax knowing I got what I came for. Not only did I have great footage in the bag, but I left prepared for what is to come to Southern Illinois. The Great American Eclipse will be here on August 21, 2017 and I’ll be there with my camera. It will be truly amazing to watch it and a whole new generation start their eclipse adventures.

See you in Southern Illinois for the Great American Eclipse!

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THE ECLIPSE ADVENTURE CONTINUES: STAYING SUNNY IN TUCSON, AZ.

From Alaska to Hawaii: My adventure on Alaska Airlines flight 870 and the Eclipse.

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