BURLINGTON, Vt. (WCAX) – As thousands are expected to travel to Burlington this weekend, the Echo Leahy Center for Lake Champlain is hosting an eclipse festival with activities for all.
Eclipse excitement is here in the Green Mountain State, and the Echo Center has many educational activities planned. Chris Dwyer of the Echo Center has studied the eclipse in-depth and was happy to shed light on some misconceptions about the solar event.
“Well, as you may know, a solar eclipse is when the moon blocks out the light of the sun, which you may not know – is that our moon is a lot smaller than our sun. We have a model of the sun right up there. Really big and hanging in our museum. And compared to the sun, our moon is about as big as this pencil eraser to our huge model over there. Even though it’s so small, it’s able to block out the sun completely. And that’s because even though it’s really tiny compared to the sun, it’s also a lot closer to us,” he said.
Dwyer showcased an activity where someone could simulate an eclipse by using a crafted moon on a stick.
“If you can try to hold it between yourself and the moon. You can simulate an eclipse by blocking out that sun in front of your vision. Yeah, even though this ball, this moon is so much smaller than the big one hanging there, it’s able to block it out just based on how far away you are… As it turns out, the moon is about 400 times smaller than the sun, but it’s also about 400 times closer to Earth than the sun is. And because of that crazy coincidence, Earth is the only planet we know of that gets a total solar eclipse,” he said.
The eclipse festival is kicking off on Friday at 10 a.m. There will be events and educational opportunities through Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday through the viewing.