On Monday, April 8, the moon passed between the earth and the sun, and as a result the sky is totally dark for a moment. We watched it in the 8th hour at 2 p.m. 

The eclipse began in Mexico at around 11:07 a.m. and ended in Maine at 3:55 p.m.. The path of totality is 115 miles long and crosses through 13 states. The magnitude in O’Fallon was calculated as 97.5%, so not totality. 

It’s the first eclipse to go through North America in seven years. Normally, there are two to four eclipses a year, but they go over the ocean and we don’t see them. 

Some don’t know why we have to wear protective glasses. It’s for safety because the sun rays can burn through the lens and cause injury and even blindness. The sun is too bright so you need to watch the spectacle through a filter.

Students commented how it’s really nice that the Wentzville School District gave out the protective classes and to give us the opportunity to watch the phenomena. 

“It was kind of disappointing because I was expecting it to be a lot darker and longer. We went inside from the football field so early,” sophomore Emerson Stubblefield, explained. 

She said that they sat outside and it was super exciting when the last eclipse occurred and it was like a celebration party, when she was in third grade. 

“I was sad that we weren’t in the path of totality and we couldn’t really see it go fully dark,” senior Madison Barnes said.

But it was also nostalgic and the eclipse took Barnes back to elementary school wearing the glasses and sitting on the field with her friends and watching the spectacle.

So overall some people were disappointed because the path of totality wasn’t 100% and it didn’t get fully dark, but it was still an interesting event to see and many people thought back to elementary school.

According to NASA, the next solar eclipse will occur on August 23, 2044, but it won’t be visible in Missouri.