This past Monday – April 8, 2024 – one of the most spectacular cosmic phenomena happened in the United States. This total eclipse was a rare event, and its path of totality, which is the area where the moon completely covers the sun, passed through several major cities and a partial eclipse was visible in the greater Philadelphia area.

There are different types of solar eclipses according to NASA’s website: Partial, Annular, Hybrid, and Total. 

The last total solar eclipse visible from our area was on June 16, 1806. According to USA Today, during the 2017 eclipse which was only partially visible to us in our area, “[traffic] congestion lasted for up to 13 hours after totality.” That was when the path of totality was in only around four major cities, but this path was almost double that. The traffic this year was nearly 12 hours just in the New England area alone, according to Fortune. 

Even though we were not one of the schools that had a half day or off, the eclipse generated excitement among students and teachers at Hatboro-Horsham. Mrs. Hersker, an AP Lit and English III teacher, was especially excited about this particular eclipse.

“This is a rare and special occasion for people to get out and witness a cool natural phenomenon. I tried watching the solar eclipse in 2017 but it wasn’t nearly as impressive as I thought it would be because of the weather. This time, I plan on watching from some point around the building and finding a nice place to view it with the glasses provided by the school district.”

Some students had sports during the event. Junior and lacrosse athlete Nolan Walker said his plans were to “bunker down in the school and try to find someone to share their glasses with me.” Most after school activities were still active, yet middle and elementary school activities were canceled. The main office was providing glasses but ran out rather quickly.

Freshman Noah Marcus said, “I want to try to get out of school as early as I can to get a good view of it. Also make sure not to look directly into the sun!” Sophomore Tristan Jones, junior Nick Mergen and junior Angelina Gamero all had a similar plan. However, Angelina said, “I might just nap after school.” Some had the mindset that there are going to be pictures of it online, so why bother?

The next total eclipse to pass over the U.S. will be in 20 years. Hopefully there won’t be any cloud cover wherever you are!