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Thursday, August 03, 2017

Planning To Watch The Eclipse? Here's What You Need To Protect Your Eyes

When Ralph Chou was about 12 years old, he took all the right precautions to watch his first solar eclipse.

"I did other stupid things, but when it came to looking at that eclipse, I was being very careful," says Chou, a professor emeritus of optometry and vision science at the University of Waterloo, who's a leading authority on eye damage from eclipse viewing.

The upcoming total solar eclipse will be the 19th one he has seen after a lifetime of eclipse chasing. And Chou is worried about first-timers and other folks who might look up at the spectacle without much forethought.

Tens of millions of people are expected to view the first total solar eclipse visible from the contiguous United States in nearly 40 years.

"Unfortunately, I think it is probably true that during every solar eclipse, there's bound to be somebody who does get hurt," says Chou.

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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not watching. I saw "Day of the Triffids".

Anonymous said...

I saw them back in the 50s or 60s. (map)

Anonymous said...

Polarized sunglasses are perfect for all the Hillary Clinton voters!




They don't have any eyesight to lose, they are already in the dark!

Anonymous said...

A pinhole in a piece of paper is best, the more perfect hole the better, as in a punched hole. Or foil. Use a cardboard box for a "darkroom", or projection room with a simple paper screen and a head hole to view the paper screen.

You can't look directly at the eclipse unless you're right directly in the path and it's 100% eclipsed.

If you do that too much, you'll go blind, Mom said!

Anonymous said...

Going to Nashville, TN on the 21st. Total eclipse there.