Safely view Saturday’s solar eclipse at Joliet Junior College

Safely view Saturday’s solar eclipse on the grounds of Joliet Junior College.

The JJC free solar eclipse viewing event will run from 10:15 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. outside its event center at 1215 Houbolt Road in Joliet. No registration or RSVP is required.

The college will provide a limited number of solar eclipse viewers, said Noella Dcruz, professor of astronomy at the college.

A specialized solar telescope will be available at the event so attendees can view solar prominences, Dcruz said. Attendees may also view projected images of the sun using Sunspotter telescopes.

“It will not be as spectacular as it was in 2017. It will be a much thicker crescent.”
— Noella Dcruz, professor of astronomy, Joliet Junior College

Blind and visually impaired attendees can experience the eclipse through a LightSound device attached to a loudspeaker, which Harvard University developed, Dcruz said.

“It produces a musical tone based on the intensity,” she said. “So if the intensity goes down, the musical tone goes down in pitch. That was obviously built for the solar eclipse. But you can play it with any light source.”

About 1,500 people came out to JJC for the solar eclipse in August 2017, but it’s hard to predict Saturday’s attendance at this point, Dcruz said.

Everyone who attended the Joliet Junior College free solar eclipse viewing event in 2017 received viewers. The 2023 event is Saturday. (Geoffery Stellfox)

“Well, it kind of depends on the weather. It also depends on the eclipse itself,” Dcruz said.

Also, the 2017 event did not occur on a Saturday, so more people were already on campus.

In 2017, the moon covered 88% of the sun, she said. For Saturday’s eclipse, the moon will cover only about 44% of the sun, Dcruz said.

“So it will not be as spectacular as it was in 2017. It will be a much thicker crescent,” Dcruz said. “It depends if people would still like to see that.”

Dcruz refuted a common myth that you should stay inside with the curtains drawn during a solar eclipse.

“The sun is up every day,” Dcruz said. “But you should be very careful not to look directly at the sun. It is very bright, and it could permanently damage your eyes.”

A semi truck crosses an overpass on Interstate 80 near Princeton as the sun rises behined it during a annular solar eclipse on Thursday June 10, 2021. (Scott Anderson)

The American Astronomical Society has an entire site dedicated to Saturday’s solar eclipse, including ways to safely view it from home.

Attendees at JJC on Saturday will be able to watch NASA’s live-feed of the annular solar eclipse in the turf area of the event center, in EC-1001, Dcruz said.

The annulus is a thin “ring of fire” that occurs as the moon incompletely covers the sun’s disk as it moves between the earth and the sun, Dcruz said.