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CNN Live Event/Special
CNN International: Eclipse Across America. Aired 3-4p ET
Aired April 08, 2024 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[15:00:01]
THOMAS RIDDLE, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, ROPER MOUNTAIN SCIENCE CENTER: So we have to be just precisely right and so you'll see the sun is now casting its light on the sha -- on the, on the moon and the shadow of the moon is being cast onto the Earth. And we are -- there's the sun.
ELISA RAFFA, CNN WEATHER ANCHOR: Yeah.
RIDDLE: And there we go. It's about 150 miles around. I'm moving around. There we go.
RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: I'm heading around, don't worry.
RIDDLE: Wires.
QUEST: So well basically go around each other, right?
RIDDLE: So I have to move around you.
QUEST: Yes.
RIDDLE: I'm moving around just a little. It's a cosmic dance.
QUEST: Right.
RIDDLE: It's just a cosmic dance.
RAFFA: And the sun is the center of the universe, right? The sun stays stationary.
RIDDLE: Of our solar system.
QUEST: All right.
RAFFA: Yeah, and this only works because this son is that much bigger and farther the way -- farther away than the rest of it.
QUEST: All right. So let me go back to do you know how I was really very irresponsible. A nearly tried to look up without these.
Hey, Rahel, it is quite something to see. I would say that I'm hoping for totality, but I don't know that it's not going to happen, Rahel.
RAFFA: I'm not -- QUEST: Just about that. What time do I get -- what time do we get it
here?
RAFFA: It's like 3:06.
So, we'll have to watch two is see how the temperatures response, because even though were not in totality, we'll have to see if they dip a little bit. You know, it depends on the clouds and the humidity to the shadow.
QUEST: You could be cool to me. I saw you out here.
RIDDLE: Thanks.
QUEST: Right.
What is interesting as well as even though we have got so, even though we have got so much, 80 percent. It's still bright right here.
RAFFA: Yeah, yeah. The difference between 99 percent and the totality when it comes to the darkness, it's like 10,000 times, right?
QUEST: Right.
RAFFA: It's incredible what that 1 percent can do it.
RIDDLE: It is. That's why you want to be in totality.
QUEST: We got people over there looking. And, madam, make sure you've got your glasses on it, please, please. You do talking about iPhones and phones.
RIDDLE: You put your eye out kid.
QUEST: Did it work? Did you get the picture? Let's all know -- did it -- did it get anything?
Oh, like this where you go? Because now were going to prove she put the eyeglasses over the lens of the phone. And this is why you don't get enough message. Oh, no, look at that. Look at that.
RAFFA: Did it work?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, not really.
QUEST: At least you know, it was at the moment. Oh, and a reminder to buy something for dinner.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, yeah.
(LAUGHTER)
QUEST: There you have it, Rahel. And we're not a few more minutes, we will get to 80 percent. We'll see if the temperature drops will see what happens but at the moment, Atlanta is experiencing --
RAFFA: Partial.
QUEST: I can't --
RIDDLE: You can't make the penumbra.
QUEST: We're having a bit of a penumbra up here.
RIDDLE: Really are.
RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN HOST: All right. Richard, thank you.
BILL WEIR, CNN HOST: Richard Quest on the roof with the disco ball, or as we call it, Monday.
SOLOMON: Yeah. Around these parts? Yes, it's just a typical Monday a number.
Penumbra, so a lot of people in the U.S. will be experiencing a penumbra.
WEIR: A lot of umbraphiles.
SOLOMON: Okay.
WEIR: That is someone who loves shadows, who chases eclipses. An umbraphile, I learned that last night.
SOLOMON: I love that, okay.
WEIR: Yeah.
SOLOMON: So while we wait here in Atlanta for this, this partial eclipse, we want to take you off to Indianapolis, Indiana, because that's where a total eclipse is expected. That's supposed to happen in just a few minutes this show and the sky will continue throughout this hour. It's been really fascinating to watch from Mexico to Texas, just sort of watch this, this happy coincidence, this dance in the sky. We've seen and we will see totality in places like Cleveland, Ohio, Vermont, Boston, the state of Maine, and the total eclipse will also cross the southern border into Canada and that's where it then goes off to see and come to a close on the Atlantic coast.
WEIR: Yep, out of Newfoundland there, yeah.
In Indianapolis, the old brickyard where home of the Indianapolis 500 auto race, of course. No fumes and engines roaring today, it's all about stargazing and science and connection as people fill the stands there to see totality in Indianapolis.
SOLOMON: You know, what's fascinating about Indiana. I mean, that's a state that actually sees quite a bit of tourism because of different events, right? But they're still expecting this event to blow those events out of the water in terms of tourism.
So, what do you take that to mean in terms of what it says about our fascination with, with space its in the sky and the sun and the moon? WEIR: That surprises me given the basketball crowds and auto racing crowds gather in that state there. I guess just the universality of it, right? We all may or not -- may or may not like car racing or sports in that way.
[15:05:03]
But being seen, something, a phenomenon so awesome, so rare, so interesting, the way that connects us in so many ways. It's such a nice break from the man-made rancor these days. It's a nonpartisan event where its safe as long as you don't burn your retinas and together with neighbors and strangers, and feel something beyond ourselves. It's really something.
SOLOMON: Yeah, it's been called -- I've heard it called the great connector. The great uniter, because it brings people certainly nonpartisan, but brings people from all over the world, right? So this, this path of totality across 15 states to witness this -- this really rare event.
You know, one thing we didn't talk about today is that while many people will see this event from the ground, there are also some companies -- I think Deltas, one of them Southwest and other one also planning flights to sort of try to track the path of totality, which is fairly cool.
WEIR: Yeah, it would be interesting to see how that works. Does -- do if the pilot is doing sort of an s serpentine turns. So both people on both sides --
SOLOMON: Yeah, how about that?
WEIR: -- can look up, because you know, if you're on the wrong side of the plane, you might miss a landmark here and there.
SOLOMON: Yeah. But there's also those -- those NASA flights the WB-57, which can fly way up ten miles high, 60,000 feet. And they're staying in the path of totality to try to measure that corona using all different kinds of instruments as well.
It's just -- looking at this last time there was a total eclipse in Indianapolis was something like 900 years ago.
SOLOMON: Wow.
WEIR: When the Potawatomi and the Kickapoo and the Iroquois and the Shawnee were looking up probably with equal wonder and fascination and different scientific definitions and what we have now, but the same sort of humanity and humbling moment.
SOLOMON: And let's listen together as Indianapolis experiences this total solar eclipse.
(INAUDIBLE)
SOLOMON: And for those who are watching this split-screen, obviously on the one side where we're witnessing the total solar eclipse there from the vantage point of Indianapolis. And then the other side is the on-the-ground view and our guests of the four hours -- I was going to say the guest of the hour -- guest of the four hours, Tom Riddell (ph), I'm pointing out earlier that what you're witnessing on the ground there isn't sort of pitch black. Its not total darkness, but it might be something I think Tom, you said it sort of feels like dusk before dawn.
RIDDLE: Yeah. It really does, a little bit dusk, duskier than dusk. But a little bit darker than dusk, but it's just something unique. I mean, you really can't explain it. It's especially -- I think it's part of it has to do with our with our with our brain. Thinking, hey, that shouldn't broad daylight, we shouldn't be here, you know, at this level of darkness, but yeah, it's just fantastic.
I'm so excited for all of these people. You know, there was a lot of predictions about the weather and I'm just so excited and what has -- Bill, one thing that has really struck me today is the prominences. I mean, those -- those -- look, I mean, its been amazing to see the number of them.
WEIR: It's going off, as the kids say, and just the sheer and try to imagine --
SOLOMON: Remind us what prominences are.
WEIR: Plasma in there, just exploding and almost like geysers of this molten fourth element that's -- it's gas that's heated up so hot it becomes plasma. And those magnetic forces are roiling and ripping apart based on these explosions, it's thermonuclear explosions, it's what were trying to capture with nuclear fusion energy. Nuclear fission splits the out and fusion mashes them together with such force, hydrogen atoms that it turns them into helium. And then there's all this energy extra energy as a byproduct of that.
It's really hard for us to do on Earth to create those conditions but that's exactly what was going for, sort of a self perpetuating ball of energy like that. If we could harness that power that we're seeing there down here on earth and abundant limitless source of clean energy, and it would be safe enough to blow out like a match? No meltdowns, no waste. That's not why its one of the holy grails of clean energy, but here we get to see the OG form of nuclear fusion in all its glory.
[15:10:06]
RIDDLE: That's a reminder of just the sheer power of the sun
SOLOMON: Yeah.
RIDDLE: -- to see that.
SOLOMON: Well, to that point, Tom, we've -- we've spoken a lot about eye safety and the importance of glasses, anything that people should know if they have yet to experience it and they plan to, in terms of skin safety, in terms of if you're -- if you're out, if you're watching I mean, is this an if is this the time that you really need to lather up the sunscreen. I mean, what do you think?
RIDDLE: No, no more than normal.
SOLOMON: Okay.
RIDDLE: Yeah. No, no, no. No more than normal.
SOLOMON: Okay.
RIDDLE: Wow, look at those. That's just spectacular and here's the diamond ring. Here we go.
QUEST: I always think its interesting and we know this is going to happen and we know that next year, I think its Spain, Barcelona and Greenland. I think gone unnoticed. And where of where next is show we know when the next one in this country is in U.S. is 2044.
WEIR: Right, yeah.
QUEST: And knowing it makes not a jot of difference, we can't stop it, we can't change it and --
WEIR: We can mark it around it, but that's about all we can do.
QUEST: Nothing wrong with that.
RIDDLE: No, especially with so many of these towns that, it's been great --
WEIR: What a boon for them, absolutely, yeah.
RIDDLE: Absolutely. And here's just a shout out to for all those organizers, there's event organizers. It's an incredible feat to pull off something like this. So congratulations, you've done it guys.
QUEST: I mean, its fascinating to watch all of this and how it is how it is moving, moving forward.
Now, we'll come back to and just I want to show you where we are what is happening and how things have been developing. And so what we've got to -- my wires are coming adrift.
What we've got here, of course, we've been through Atlanta and Little Rock and we're heading up now towards the northeast of the country as the eclipse moves forward and then up to -- there we go. Let's push that button and see what happens. Because one of the most important aspects of the day is how people are learning about it, what their -- what were teaching people like me, well, for kids big and little.
Chris Packham is with me to talk about this.
Chris, what have you been telling them? Where -- where are you? And what have you been telling them?
CHRIS PACKHAM, PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS & ASTRONOMY, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS: I'm in a wonderful Spurs facility here in San Antonio, Texas. We just went through the eclipse. It was cloudy, but boy, it was still an incredible event. The sky went completely dark. Of course, we had a series of STEM stations. We have NASA come in, folks coming in from Hawaii, Germany, many other places, and perhaps most excitingly for the kids, we have the coyote and the hype squad. And it was an incredible event.
QUEST: How do you explain to them what's happening? And I'm sure I have a nasty feeling there was probably a lot of cardboard boxes, papers, and pinhole cameras.
PACKHAM: Well, the way that I like to explain it is that its such an incredible coincidence that the moon is about 400 times smaller than sun, but its full 100 times closer. So those two things cancel out. Once you put it in that way, it's actually quite easy to understand what's going on and the choice to get people involved in stem. And that was really the goal of what we wanted to do at our event here.
QUEST: All right. One of the children you've got next to you. How did they find? Asked them, let me let me see can tell it to speak louder. How do they enjoy it?
UNIDENTIFIED KID: I thought it was very interesting. And something that I learned was that they're going to be very big telescope that is going to try and find different life on different planets.
QUEST: Now, obviously this is your first. I'm not sure if you can hear me, but maybe you could just ask him, what did she learn? What did any of them learn from having gone through this experience? How did they feel it?
PACKHAM: What did you learn?
UNIDENTIFIED KID: Like she said, I learned that there was going to be a telescope that they're going to see if there is life on any other planets. I like that we were learning stuff about space and not only just about the eclipse.
QUEST: The hardest question of all for you, Chris, do you think today instilled in any of those great youngsters you've got there a STEM interest? Because we all know that that is the future to learn about. What do you think? Ask, find out.
PACKHAM: I'm pretty sure that the answer is yes. We had again these wonderful giveaways from NASA. These momentous people could take and we had eclipse.
[15:15:01]
So I'm pretty sure that the takeaway was there.
But if I may, let me just ask a question. What do you think? Did you think -- are you inspired into STEM? You want to look at the camera and say, if that's inspired?
I think that's -- that's a cautious yes I heard there.
QUEST: You do realize -- you do realize, sir, that the entire future of the U.S. science and ability to innovate is in your hands
PACKHAM: I tried my best as a professor here at UTSA.
QUEST: I've got news for you. They've got one thing over you and me probably, one thing. Do you know what that is?
PACKHAM: I'm excited. No, please tell me.
QUEST: They'll probably be around for the next one. I'm not sure about you and me.
(LAUGHTER)
PACKHAM: Sadly, I think you're correct
QUEST: Sir, I'm honored and grateful that you've joined us. Thank you, professor of physics and astronomy, Chris Packham. I'm grateful for you.
Now, well, you know, it's a true fact. I mean, when you see the younger generation like that and you, realize the work that has to be done by people like Chris. This is whether it's the U.S. or E.U., or Australasia, the investment is phenomenal and needs to be.
RIDDLE: It absolutely because that is literally investing in our future, and one thing I -- a positive outcome from the pandemic was just how we all went to -- we all went online. The world really got smaller and so we've been able to connect with -- students have been able to connect like they haven't in past, young people as well, with their peers around the world and just being able to create, you know, to capital realize off that synergy for education has been phenomenal.
QUEST: I'm afraid -- I'm afraid I've half the production team, they've all gone to --
(LAUGHTER)
There was a moment. My pinhole camera work really well. I could see on -- I couldn't see any crescent, but I could see a light okay. So it worked.
And your disco ball -- but just to look at it.
RIDDLE: With your own eyes.
QUEST: With your own eyes.
RIDDLE: Wear your glasses on.
QUEST: Yeah. What do you got?
All right. Where are we got totality at the moment, Cleveland. Cleveland, Ohio, is just --
WEIR: Look at that plasma going off.
QUEST: Is that the thing in the bottom right, at 5:00?
RIDDLE: It is.
QUEST: So, what's interesting is we've had that plasma going off as you technically put it, in that same position in all the places it's not just because that's where it is.
WEIR: It's a good question. Yeah. I mean, given the angles or even as a cameras shift, but are our perspective to the sun doesn't change that dramatically. So yeah, look --
RIDDLE: No, it's a massive flare.
WEIR: It's a massive explosion there.
RIDDLE: Yes, it is, and we're at solar maximum of course as well. So yeah, I think there's going to be some -- some great data that comes out of this. I can't wait to see what that's going to be.
QUEST: But each year, there are all solar eclipses, right? I learned -- I mean, this happens --
RIDDLE: About every, every 18 months somewhere --
QUEST: Yeah.
RIDDLE: I'm glad you mentioned earlier, Bill, because you could be it could fall in the middle of the ocean. But for it to happen in any one given place consecutively can be hundreds of years apart. So for us to have across our nation these two eclipses seven years apart has been fantastic.
WEIR: There were a bunch -- there was a flurry of them like back in the '20s, there was what's four or five, relatively short, right after another at a time when telescopes were just coming in now into maturity. And then the one in 2044, I believe I think they're going to be another one right after year after a two. So there's no rhyme or reason to the rhythm of it because it's just these random shadows bouncing around a complicated milky way.
SOLOMON: We want to go to Niagara Falls now, where they are just moments away from totality. This is this, is an area where they are expecting hundreds, thousands of visitors, including the governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, is expected to be there as well as totality is underway as, we've witnessed today from Mexico to the Texas, to Ohio, and now Niagara Falls.
QUEST: And from we will wend its my way up towards Vermont, I've got my notes somewhere they will go up from buffalo and then to Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and then Canada. You get to experience it and enjoy it.
What I find fascinating, we are seeing the same event in the same way happening in these difficult -- oh, let's listen to somebody is having a moment.
[15:20:17]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's see what I mean. It's like night again.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. We got to get a picture of this, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, yes, quick.
QUEST: I do have to -- I'm not going to do something indecent. Well, not talking about meeting in Zoom.
WEIR: Human nature always at play.
QUEST: Yeah, and they are, they've got three minutes and 46 seconds.
WEIR: It's funny the last time, I was in -- following an event like this in Niagara Falls was I was covering years ago. Nik Wallenda walking across the high wire over Niagara Falls. Nik Wallenda, remember, and there is like everybody gathering to watch one person's effort. But in this case, it's sort of the opposite of that. Everybody on Earth gathering, well, not on Earth, but in these dense cities, gathering to something bigger than us, bigger than human achievement.
SOLOMON: Which I think you read my mind because I was thinking the same thing as you started to say at how we've witnessed -- if you've been with us for the last three-and-a-half hours or so, you have witnessed the same, how we have witnessed this event, and how different people have experienced the same event from different places. And that has been really fascinating, but that reminded me of a conversation we had a bit earlier with a gentleman who has witnessed 84 total solar eclipses. And we asked do you have a favorite and something he said really struck with me. He said each one is sort of different, you know, which is which --
WEIR: I collect sunsets around like this is one of the book, you know, what where what are meeting, whom, with, you know?
SOLOMON: Yeah.
QUEST: You see, with that, how much of that is where you are in your life in this moment?
WEIR: In human history, right?
QUEST: That's I think, I get the scientists will tell me that it all to do with, you know, well, penumbra, or the corona, I've never seen the diamond ring like that.
RIDDLE: Yeah.
QUEST: But at the end of the day, it's --
RIDDLE: Yeah, at the end of the day it's about -- to me, it's about relationships with others, experiencing with others. It's about finding our place in the universe in the greater scheme of things and I think there's power in that. And that would explain why when you talk to people who have witnessed a solar eclipse, when you read the narratives of people who have experienced a total solar eclipse, you often hear that it's a really emotional experience that people cry, the people gasp that there was a sort of -- there was a sort of eerie silence to it all.
RIDDLE: Right. And I think for me and those I experienced it with and so in '17 --
QUEST: Sorry, forgive me ever -- we just lost, we've just come out of totality as you can see from that picture on the left of your screen in Niagara Fall, and the light has come back very -- that's the thing that struck me most it comes back, with a passion an the force.
WEIR: And more so with the midst, there, how that light plays with those water particles.
QUEST: Now Tupper Lake, New York, which is just a bit further up is going to get its own totality, where it will enjoy it --
SOLOMON: But, Tom, finish your thought. You were just saying in 2017.
RIDDLE: Yeah. I think it was a sense of euphoria afterwards. It was what did we just experienced because the conversations afterwards, were incredible and you could you could feel the energy you could feel the love more or less from everyone was like wow, thank you. Thank you for experiencing this with me. It was -- it was phenomenal.
SOLOMON: It's also something to be said about experiencing it as a community. I mean, you hear these watch party, some of which are really big and sort of experiencing this sort of otherworldly event.
WEIR: What's the main appeal of a great music festival or you are your church congregation, right? That's how its connect the same sheared motivations were here to celebrate something beyond ourselves. We all know the words to this song and connects us and puts the raises -- the hair in the back, your head together. And this is the same --
SOLOMON: There's the strength in the numbers there.
WEIR: It's totally.
QUEST: It's about the four of us sitting here now, enjoying the moment and enjoying each other.
RIDDLE: Absolutely
QUEST: And on that note, we'll take a break, but there is still at least another 40 odd minutes or so. Please don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:27:32]
SOLOMON: Welcome back to our special coverage of "Eclipse Across America". The great American eclipse as it has been called.
We want to go to Indianapolis now, that's where we find CNN's Mike Valerio. We've also got Miguel Marquez. He is in Cleveland, both sort of experiencing these events from obviously different vantage points.
We want to start -- and Richard experiencing from his vantage point here with our -- with our prop, we want to start with CNN's Nick Valerio who's in Indianapolis.
All right. Mike, might give us a sense of what you've experienced and what you've seen.
MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, this is something we have never seen before. People in the pit lane and the racing lane of this Mecca to racing. So let's show you a bit of what is still left over. So you see this is the pit lane right here covered with media. And as we go further over to the right, you will see the racing lanes of the home of the Indy 500 still filled with people.
Only a few minutes ago, we all together, Rahel, witnessed the tremulous magic -- or scratch that. I'm not going to go with tremulous. The dazzling magic of the corona. And there was a gasp from the crowd as the twilight fell over us, that 360 degree twilight, as we heard the soundtrack of interstellar, and then return of the Jedi at a waltz came on.
It was beautiful and breathtaking as the crowd began to really bloom with life, people coming from hundreds of miles, hundreds of kilometers away from here when they had inclement weather in Texas, in Oklahoma, and southern Illinois to see one of the most spectacular views with a beautiful summer day, tea with my t-shirt that they could possibly hope for the best conditions.
It was interesting, Rahel, we have wonderful cadre of NASA scientists, physicists from the Heliophysics division of NASA in charge of trying to study the mystery of the brilliant corona that we just saw, because the dance between the earth and the moon, that's a known thing. But when were talking about the chaos of the corona, this solar energy that can come our way, knowing how to predict solar energy that could wreak havoc on our communication systems, on our electrical grid.
The scientists were also elated looking at the jumbo screens, looking at their instruments a width us to see totality lasting for three minutes and 49 seconds here at the heart of this great American race witnessing its great American eclipse.
[15:30:04]
QUEST: All right.
SOLOMON: Well said, dazzling and chaotic.
QUEST: Miguel Marquez, what have you got for us? Where are you?
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm in Cleveland, gorgeous Cleveland, rocking Cleveland. And it is totally fantastic Cleveland today. That -- this crowd -- this is the science center here, there are thousands of people here still, they're starting to stream out now, but it was so moving. I don't know what it is about an eclipse where people want to come together. Well, you come over here. You just walked up to us and wanted to say you came in from northern Virginia. Why so important to come together with other people to see this thing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah, it was an event. We could watch it from the hotel where were staying, but the event you got to -- it's an event, it is.
MARQUEZ: And I can say it was stunning. It was gorgeous. I've never seen anything, maybe more beautiful in my life.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's very cool, very cool, almost like, oh, welders light right before it went out completely in this clouds turn all silvery.
MARQUEZ: It is spectacular. The pink bits that you see come off the sun. You can see so that people sort of moving around here. Thank you very much. And have a lovely trip home. Thank you very much.
Those pink that you see coming off the sun, those are the ejections from the sun that will eventually become the solar wind. And they look tiny, tiny, tiny on camera, but they are thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of kilometers long. We were speaking with Kelly Couric (ph) who's -- she's seen three eclipses, total eclipses and one annular eclipse. She was bouncing up and down. She was so excited when it did that diamond ring thing.
It is absolutely stunning to see. It is -- you think its not going to move you, you think, okay, it's an eclipse. Got it. It's just the sun in a shadow of the moon but it is such a moving experience.
There is something that feels spiritual about it. There is something that's incredibly human. The fact that everybody has to come together to -- there are places all over Cleveland that are doing this. Rock and Roll Hall of fame next to us, the Oval, the Wade Oval, which is a beautiful parks near the Case Western University here, they're doing a big gathering today as well. Spectacular.
Richard, sorry.
QUEST: And hard bitten correspondent like you, who's done his fair -- who's done his fair share of war, baffling misery. Are you telling me you've got a heart and you felt it?
MARQUEZ: It almost made me cry and being here with Kelly Couric in listening to her, this professional, she looks at it in terms of the science, but even she was so moved by what we were seeing. It was absolutely gorgeous. Its just a beautiful thing to see and the number of people who are cheering, the awe that this crowds sort of felt may look, they actually have NASA here and they're replaying -- oh, that's Houlton, that's the next spot where its going so people are able to watch it in other places.
But that, that beauty of the moment, it was just, it was so moving, it was incredibly moving. And it and it felt -- I sort of, I've seen an annular eclipse before where you get the big corona caught coming off of it. This is my first total eclipse.
It was spectacular, absolutely gorgeous way.
What -- what did you think of it all, what -- you two?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: W thought it was incredible. You know, I've seen several solar eclipses, as you mentioned, the annular. I saw one in '94. My first one was '91, partial, and then 2017 was amazing. This though, was the best I've ever seen.
MARQUEZ: This is your first I'll take it?
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: Well, it is not the first but one that I remember seeing.
MARQUEZ: What do you make of it?
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: I thought it was really cool.
MARQUEZ: Really cool.
Where are you guys in from?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're here from Detroit.
MARQUEZ: Detroit?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And he's from Chicago, but Cleveland is rocking the right now. So we've got to give it all up.
MARQUEZ: Cleveland came. We thought it was going to be cloudy. We woke up, it was raining this morning and it was spectacular.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was spectacular. I mean, the thing about it is, that makes it interesting, as we saw the diamond ring effect. And then Bailey's beast, the sun coming through the mountains, and then the prominences and everything, and there was a halo around the sun from the upper atmospheric like ice crystal. It was like -- it was unbelievable.
MARQUEZ: Oh, maybe you got all that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Unbelievable. I saw it. I was happy to be here Great Lakes Science Center. They do a great job here.
MARQUEZ: That was just fantastic. And why, why have to -- why come to -- what you can start in your hotel parking lot. Why come with all these people have to gather together?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah. Well, I'm president and CEO of the Michigan Science Center in Detroit.
MARQUEZ: Oh, right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One of my best friends and mentors, actually two of them are right here in Cleveland at the Great Lakes Science Center, grew up at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, where I got my first start. These organizations, these museums make it possible for us to do its kinds of things wonderful thing for kids to see, for school groups, the public everything.
MARQUEZ: All right.
And are you now eclipse chaser?
[15:35:02]
UNIDENTIFIED BOY: And yeah.
MARQUEZ: And yes. Absolutely, eclipse chaser. I am, too.
SOLOMON: Miguel --
MARQUEZ: Thank you very much.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Great, thank you.
SOLOMON: The enthusiasm there on the ground is infectious, but what a sight to behold, Miguel Marquez talking about love, talking about emotions, talking about it being so moving. What a sight to behold.
Miguel Marquez, live for us there, Miguel, thanks so much.
You know, he's not the only one feeling emotional, Richard.
QUEST: I felt emotional.
SOLOMON: Yes. Yes, I know, but love is also in the air literally.
We have some breaking news into CNN.
QUEST: Tada-dadada-dadada!
SOLOMON: A man just proposed to his girlfriend during the total solar eclipse has happened in Stowe, Vermont. Let's listen and watch together.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You marry me?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: An engagement during a total solar eclipse.
OK. This is a supernatural moment as -- sun comes back.
True love story cemented in the darkness of a total solar eclipse, now written in history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SOLOMON: Written in history and written in the stars.
QUEST: I've got a tweet to read you. It's from the tweet account or the X account of NASA Moon. So from NASA Moon tweeted, oops, I did it again.
SOLOMON: Britney Spears, yeah, a little more.
QUEST: We'll be back in just a moment with the wall eclipse. NASA very clever, oops, I did it again.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:40:25]
QUEST: We're in the last moments of our coverage of the eclipse, but there's plenty more. The eclipse has finished in the United States, but it's not over yet. Sun and moon have more business to be dealing with.
SOLOMON: The dances aren't over just yet.
QUEST: No, the dance is most certainly -- it's still going round each other, round each other and they're off in Canada now.
SOLOMON: Yeah. And we want to actually -- well, we want to go to Rochester, New York, not too far.
I'd like to bring in Debra Ross. She is the chair of Rochester, New York's eclipse task force, and it looks like she has some friends with her.
Debra, good to have you. Talk to us a little bit about --
DEBRA ROSS, CHAIR, ROCHESTER NEW YORK ECLIPSE TASKFORCE: Thank you.
SOLOMON: -- your experience and what it's been like witnessing this with young people as well.
ROSS: Absolutely. Well, in Rochester, we've been preparing for this moment for seven years ever since the 2017 eclipse, when my teenager dragged me to totality, not knowing what the big deal was went in a skeptic, came out, transformed and immediately we started working here to make sure that this wasn't just a three-minute and 30 seconds experience, but a whole weekend.
So we've been hosting lots of people all weekend for sort of eclipse saturation. And just having more teenagers around me for this was just the best. It's the best thing ever.
SOLOMON: And what have you heard just in terms of talking to young people and their experience of the solar eclipse? What's it been like for them? Or maybe we can actually talk to someone behind you.
ROSS: Sure. Absolutely. This is Sella Seller (ph). She's one of my young people in my group. So ask Sella the question.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi.
SOLOMON: Hi, Sella. Good to have you.
What's it been like so far? What's this experience been like for you?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I thought it was truly amazing and it wasn't just something that you saw. It was something that you felt all around. You just like experiencing everything change.
SOLOMON: Yeah.
And Debra was just mentioning how they've been planning for this. I'm wondering if you were setting or if you were looking into this and if the experience was different than you expected?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It definitely was something that I was expecting. I just didn't realize how dark everything was just going to become.
SOLOMON: Yeah.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And it was truly just wonderful to see.
SOLOMON: Yeah.
And, Debra, talk to us a little bit about all of the activities that have been planned. One thing, I mean, I cover business, so I'm always sort of interested in the economic angle. But one thing that's just been really interesting to me is how so many towns and communities are really benefiting in this -- this boost and this boom of people coming into town, talk to us a little bit about the activities you guys have been unable to plan and really take advantage of?
ROSS: Absolutely, sure. So this has been a boom economically for sure, but psychologically for our community the preparation did take years, but they were years of fun. I mean, there's nothing negative about an eclipse and its omen in history in the 21st century. But oddly a moment you can plan for making deliberate. So we really did.
So we had all kinds of arts experiences. We had an original full length musical for a middle school that was written by a music director at Caulkins Road Middle School called "Midnight at Midday", they actually had me on for a guest celebrity cameo yesterday. So that was amazing.
Last night, we had the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, world's premier, an eclipse sweet by Jeff Tyzik (ph), too, an amazing light show. Nobody all the thousands of people who went to that, they'll never forget it either. And that was just leading up to this intensely emotional experience.
So financial, yes. Wonderful to be in the spotlight in Rochester but really this community, everybody who prepared together has bonded, and everybody who experienced this together. We are now bonded forever me with all of these people. I mean, I already was bonded with them, but I mean, it was just intense. Now it's amazing. SOLOMON: Yeah. And before I let you go, just talk to me a little bit
more about that, that bonding and just the emotion of the moment. What was that like?
ROSS: Yeah. So there's no experience like a total solar eclipse in which you feel science with your whole body. It was kind of like what Stella was saying. You can read about this experience. We know intellectually about the moon going around the Earth and the Earth going around the sun. And sometimes they line up.
But the feeling yourself there sort of suspended in space with the sun, the moon, and the earth lining up, and it making your world eerie and dark in a way that feels wrong. But science tells us that we know what this is. So it's not scary.
And so you feel the whole triumph of human achievement together in this moment, all of us together and I look at all these young people and I think their futures, and I think of 2045 when the next big solar eclipse in the U.S. And I want to be with all of them.
SOLOMON: Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful. Thank you for sharing your experience -- as my colleague.
That's a Debra Ross there. As my colleague Bill Weir said, one way to think about it is the next time if you were to have a newborn now and the next time, you might see one of these things, your newborn would be able to drink. So that is a really good way to think about it.
[15:45:08]
Debra Ross, thank you.
ROSS: What I want to go do right now. But we have all been (INAUDIBLE) here in Rochester, so I think I may go do that with all of their parents.
SOLOMON: Yeah, it sounds like a lovely time. Thanks so much for coming on and sharing your experience with us.
ROSS: My pleasure. Thank you.
QUEST: I'm just trying to work out.
All right. So the next one is in 2045 which is --
WEIR: '44, I think, is '44?
QUEST: '44, so that's in 20 years time, which mean I will be 82.
RIDDLE: What do you want to meet?
QUEST: Sorry.
RIDDLE: What do you want to meet? You'll still be here.
WEIR: You'll still be here, yeah. You got a hundred in you, Richard. SOLOMON: Where is this going, Richard? Where is this going?
QUEST: Yes, look, it's going nowhere, that's the problem.
(LAUGHTER)
QUEST: All right. Steve, come to please update this so I can see exactly -- push the live button and I can see exactly where this is at the moment -- this is going to show us what where it is. The eclipse at the moment has now moved out of the United States. It's moved across Canada. And indeed, it is moving just off Gander, Newfoundland, where it will head out which is a question for Tom Riddle actually.
It doesn't -- what -- when did it end? I don't mean just end here. I mean, how does it end? I mean, does what happens when suddenly it's not eclipsing?
RIDDLE: Well, it's when the moons moving out with our orbital plane and then its going to happen over, over the ocean and it'll, it'll, it'll dissipate so the moon will continue on its journey as it has. We've talked about so much today. Its dance around the earth as the earth dances around the sun, but it's just going to -- it's going to lead to orbital plane. And then the shadow will dissipate.
QUEST: I don't know whether to be sad or happy at that because it sort of connotes both, doesn't it?
WEIR: Well, it would be really bad if it stopped.
SOLOMON: Happy about that.
QUEST: When you put it like that, I'll take it spinning.
WEIR: If the shadow never left.
QUEST: If the shadow never left. It depends where it was, but it didn't leave.
All right. As you can see, how Nikki has wanted Judy broke it out. The community spirit is strong, or maybe some other spirit that -- we'll be back with more with more in just a moment. This is CNN. God be with us (ph).
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:50:11]
SOLOMON: Welcome back. If you've been with us for the last few hours, almost four hours at this point, you've witnessed as we have witnessed, this total solar eclipse, as it has taken shape from Mexico to Texas really across the United States, 15 states, in fact. It's now over eastern Canada.
QUEST: Now for those in eastern Canada just reaching totality. And as you know, its heading out towards the Atlantic Ocean now.
Stephenville's mayor is Tom Rose, and he is with me now.
So tell me, sir, how is it? What was it?
TOM ROSE, STEPHENVILLE, CANADA MAYOR: Absolutely amazing. We had a little bit of cloud cover during totality, but we did get to experience it. But something happened that I didn't expect this went once it got so dark, the horizon was absolutely beautiful.
SOLOMON: Mayor, talk to us about where exactly you are and then what made you want to sort of witness the eclipse from where you are?
ROSE: Well, actually, I'm on top of the upper deck of my son's barn and we're just here with family. We're going to break a bottle of champagne and celebrate this momentous celestial moment.
And were, I guess the word of three just in North America that totalities, happening. And a former U.S. Air Force Base in Stephenville, Newfoundland, below the 49th parallel and the community is embracing it and we're having a great time.
QUEST: Now, tell me why I should visit Stephenville. What have you got to show me?
ROSE: Well, we believed that we have one of the best weather records, Easter Montreal, and all of eastern Canada. Got a lot of history of the U.S. Air Force base in Stephenville, but our hospitality is the best and our seafood is also one of the best in the world.
SOLOMON: Listen, you had me at seafood.
QUEST: Well, we have a couple of minute yet. Thank you very much, sir. Very glad that you all with us.
ROSE: You're welcome.
QUEST: thank you. Keep the champagne on ice.
Final thoughts out on a date that was an absolutely brilliant day for us all.
SOLOMON: Yeah. For me, you know, it was so beautiful one to witnesses this with all of you because I think we've really talked a lot about the science of the mind oh man, it was so sort of enriching in that way, but also the emotion of the moment which, which for me was really, really special. And so even though I didn't get to witness it on the ground, this sort of felt like the next best thing just to be able to witness it with you guys.
QUEST: I was very taken but your emotion. First of all, when we saw it in Mazatlan and then when we saw it in Texas with your colleagues?
RIDDLE: Yes, so to me this it is an emotional thing. Again I think it really validates for me in many ways, although I believe and you know, it's a chance I would really hope for people to take this spirit of cooperation, the spirit of joy, the spirit of enthusiasm each other, and carried onto tomorrow and the day after and the day after.
You know look at the -- look at the moon tomorrow night look at the sun different way. Look at the stars in different way. You're still here to share that with people.
QUEST: And the moment for me where you're concerned was when you looked at that photograph of your son.
WEIR: Yeah, my little boy River. He turned 4 yesterday, has his little glasses on. He's watching in Dumbo, Brooklyn, his first 90 percent eclipse. I wish I could have been there with them, but I'm going to have to take them to Spain for the next one here.
One of my favorite stories as a kid was Mark Twain, a Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's court, where the protagonist travels back in time and is about to be burned at the stake and realizes, wait there was an eclipse on this day and says, unless you let me go, I will blot out the sun any some way parlays that know -- uses that knowledge and parlays it into a position with the king, and a cut of the coffers and all of that.
But now I think, we know so much about these events. He traveled back in time now to April 8, 2024, it's not a threat. It's more of a promise that we're going to connect together and have a rare moment of human peace and harmony and joy around something bigger than us all.
QUEST: You say it's not a threat, but is it a clarion call that reminds us if we screw around with the climate to as much as we are doing, were in for trouble.
WEIR: I like that. I like that anything that reminds us --
QUEST: We can't stop it because this thing happened
WEIR: Absolutely. Yeah. And anything that reminds us of our fragility on this planet, how precious it is and the stories we tell ourselves around this.
[15:55:03]
You know, it's -- we talked, we've been talking about diamond rings, right? You should spend three months salary on that ring. That's forever. But diamonds are everywhere. It rains diamonds on other planets.
You know what special? A tree, wood is the most special substance in our galaxy because we live on the only planet that produces it. So anything that connects us beyond our little bubbles is so powerful.
QUEST: Final told from yourself.
SOLOMON: Final thought -- just to communities, just all the people who have witnessed this together in crowds. I don't think we've seen one, at least one our view of one person just watching it alone. It's the community. And so in that way, we have had nice little community up here. QUEST: Thank you for joining us today. It has been a very special
afternoon. It has been a privilege for us to spend time with you enjoying this celestial moment, wherever you may be in the world, the community that you have been part of for the last four hours. I'm very grateful.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We won't forget this in a hurry. And because the news never stops and neither do we.
This is CNN.
