Equinox Eclipse

[oloriel]

BRITISH MEDIA: Friday will bring Europe the most exciting astronomical event of the millennium so far! Celebrate with us and SEE THE SUN SMILE!

GERMAN MEDIA: Kids might look into the sun without protection and GO BLIND FOREVER! Schools should cancel recess and pull down blinds until DANGER HAS PASSED! Also, we have actually no idea whether our electric grid can handle the extreme voltage swings of sudden nationwide sunlessness/ sudden nationwide sun-back-ness! There might be blackouts! ALL IN ALL LET'S JUST HOPE FRIDAY'S GOING TO BE REALLY CLOUDY!

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you: The NEW German angst. Taking the joy out of everything since, oh, I don't actually know, but back when we had our last major eclipse, it was still considered a reason for party. And us kids were just told NOT TO LOOK INTO THE SUN WITHOUT SPECIAL ECLIPSE GLASSES, and we sort of listened? But clearly, that was so 1999 and would never work today.

Mind you, back in 1999 the eclipse was hyped for several months before the event, so everybody and their dog had plenty of time to get eclipse glasses and to grasp the idea that even a partially covered sun can still make you blind. This year, the first little notes trickled in on Monday. So clearly, there was NO TIME TO PREPARE! (~This morning's unprecedented solar eclipse is no cause for alarm!~)

(I still have my eclipse glasses from 1999. I WANT TO SEE THE SUN SMILE, DAMNIT.)

Comments

[ysilme]

I keep my fingers crossed for you! You're getting more to see than we down here anyway. ;o) We have a perfect weather forecast, so I'm curious about the power grid issue, too.
I thought one of the reason for the heavy public warning of protection is the smartphone-photographing-mania that is so omnipresent these days, and that too many clueless people would try to take a picture in this way, and endanger themselves.

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

Interesting point! Though there was no word about photographing in our newspaper, only blah about how some schools and kindergartens are reassuring parents that kids will be kept in darkened rooms throughout the eclipse. Also, I wonder if the depiction of the sun on a smart phone screen is still dangerous? People could probably point their smart phones in the sun's general direction and take pictures safely, as long as they don't look at the sun with their own eyes...

In general, I think advice on how to observe the eclipse safely would've been so much smarter than just going OH NO DANGER DANGER LET'S HOPE IT'S CLOUDY. What if it isn't cloudy?

[ysilme]

Ha, I'm partly lucky, I'm watching the livestream of spiegel.de, fun comments by passers-by inclusive. *g*

[ysilme]

I was unprecise with my handy camera argument; I meant mostly that people who would try to shoot the sun with their phone would get too much radiation while looking in that direction, because, as it seems, nowadays so many people are stupid that way. I wasn't sure if the photographing itself was safe for the camera, but know by now that it is.