Chicago-area solar eclipse hunters plan trek south to take in totality: ‘You have to experience it’

Seven years ago, Reyes Sanchez stood with his girlfriend in downtown Carbondale, amazed by a solar eclipse turning day into night in a matter of seconds.

He was equally astonished to learn that day about another solar eclipse that would pass the exact same area in southern Illinois on April 8, 2024.

“We kind of joked about it, like we’ll end up together and we’ll come back again, and probably we’ll have kids by that time,” Sanchez said, “... and now it’s happening.”

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Sanchez, his wife, Lorena Perez, and their 3-year-old daughter, Lorey, along with his brother’s family will leave their home in Riverside about 4 a.m. Monday to drive to Carbondale, take in the eclipse, then drive home.

It should take about five and a half hours to drive there, he said. Sanchez expects about an eight-hour trip home, plus he wants to find some souvenirs for his daughter to “look back on this experience” that he described as “extraordinary.”

“I’m pretty sure a lot of people are going to travel,” said Sanchez, a 34-year-old welder. “We’re planning to get some snacks, sodas, waters and everything so we only have to stop just to pump some gas and keep going.”

Around 100,000 to 200,000 people are expected to converge in southern Illinois for the phenomenon, the Illinois Department of Transportation said.

The eclipse’s path of totality, where the moon aligns perfectly with the sun and casts a shadow over Earth, will traverse about a quarter of the state, entering southern Illinois just after noon. Totality will begin about 2 p.m. and last about four minutes in Carbondale — in the crossroads of this year’s eclipse and the one in 2017.

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Joshua Frieman, a professor of astronomy and astrophysics at University of Chicago, and about 50 of his students will travel by bus to an eclipse event at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

Total eclipses aren’t rare — there’s about three each year somewhere on Earth — but it is “quite rare” for one to pass over the exact same area within as little as seven years. That typically happens “every few hundred years,” Frieman said.

University of Chicago/Provided

Carbondale also lucked out in having one of the longest periods of totality in this year’s eclipse.

“The duration of what’s called totality — when the sun is completely blocked out — that varies from eclipse to eclipse, and it varies also along the path of the eclipse, and one thing exciting is that in Carbondale, the totality will last about four minutes, and that’s on the long end of typical solar eclipses,” Frieman said.

Maureen Joy, 66, of Batavia, is looking forward to witnessing totality for the first time.

“I’m interested to see what happens with the birds, you hear they think it’s nighttime, and the bugs and the crickets,” Joy said. “Just that feeling, some people say it’s just otherworldly when this happens.”

The retired teacher, with two friends, is loading up her RV and taking it to a shared campground in Pomona, about 100 miles southeast of St. Louis, near the Shawnee National Forest, where the 75 people camping and a bluegrass band will generate the atmosphere of a small festival.

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The stunning few minutes of totality is why Greg King, a police officer from Tinley Park, is going back again this year.

“I’ve had this event on my calendar since Aug. 22, 2017 — the day after the last one,” King said, adding that his one takeaway from the previous eclipse was, “You have to experience it.”

“If you have the ability to, you need to experience a complete solar eclipse,” King, 60, said.

He booked a hotel four months ago in Evansville, Indiana, for $140 a night, before room rates skyrocketed up to $500 per night. But he’ll drive about an hour west to Burnt Prairie, Illinois, a small village in northern White County, for the eclipse.

“My parents and grandparents, everybody’s from southern Illinois, so I’m very familiar with the area,” King said. “I think I should find a nice quiet, fairly secluded spot where there won’t be tens of thousands of other people.”

King drove down Wednesday night, then hopes to wait out traffic and drive home Tuesday.

One uncertainty, however, has most travelers crossing their fingers.

“Hopefully it’s not cloudy. If it is, then it’s just a big bust,” King said.

Monday’s forecast for Carbondale is mostly sunny with a high of 73 degrees, but there is a slight chance of rain that night that has some people making backup plans.

Chris Chong, of Buffalo Grove, is continuing to keep his eyes on the forecast for southern Illinois and Indiana, as he has yet to choose a first-come, first-served campsite to pitch his tent. His tentative plan is to drive to the Carbondale area, but if the weather is poor, then he’s considering Indiana.

Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Sun-Times

Chong, hearing how “magnificent” it is to witness an eclipse in totality, was swayed by other people online to make a “spur-of-the-moment” decision last week to road trip south for the event.

“I’m definitely trying to put myself out there in more unique situations I’m not very used to,” Chong, 30, said. “Not only is this my first road trip by myself, I’ve never been that far south in Illinois.”

“I just hope that this will be another way for me to experience new things,” Chong added. “Hopefully it’ll motivate me to do more of that in the future.”

Frieman, the professor, said this would be the year for Chicagoans to roadtrip to experience totality.

“The next total eclipse visible from the United States [Montana and North Dakota] or Canada won’t be until 2044, so this is the last opportunity for people in our region to see this without traveling long distances,” he said.

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