Total Eclipse of the Sun 4 8 24

A total solar eclipse crosses North America today, with parts of 15 U.S. states within the path of totality. Maps show where and when astronomy fans can see the big event as skies darken in the middle of the day on Monday, April 8.
The total eclipse will first appear along Mexico's Pacific Coast at around 11:07 a.m. PDT, then travel across a swath of the U.S., from Texas to Maine, and into Canada.
About 31.6 million people live in the path of totality, the area where the moon will fully block out the sun, according to NASA. The path will range between 108 and 122 miles wide. An additional 150 million people live within 200 miles of the path of totality.
(per NASA) On an ordinary day, the insolation - the amount of sunlight hitting a given spot on the Earth - is proportional to the sine of the Sun's altitude. When the Sun is 30° above the horizon, the sunlight energy per square meter is half of what it is when the Sun is directly overhead. This relationship is the reason that the tropics are hot and the poles are cold. Combined with day length, it's also the reason for the difference in temperature between the seasons at temperate latitudes.
As this animation shows, the Moon's shadow dramatically, if temporarily, affects insolation in North America during the total solar eclipse of April 8, 2024. The effect is readily apparent to observers in the path of totality. As the umbra passes overhead, the temperature can drop by 10°F or more. The cooled column of air within the shadow cone can even influence cloud formation and the speed and direction of the wind.
The insolation map in the animation combines solar altitude with obscuration, the fraction of the Sun's area blocked by the Moon during the eclipse. It ignores a number of other factors, including atmospheric scattering, refraction, and cloud cover, that also play a big role in the amount of sunlight that reaches the ground.