The Rochester Museum and Science Center and Strasenburgh Planetarium are on day three on Monday of their eclipse festival that is welcoming visitors from 26 states.
The mission is and has always been to inspire curiosity and participation in science, culture and the natural world. And wow, what a time for it — and what a weekend so far. RMSC is sharing all of it, from the geology of the moon, the cosmic frontier, NASA history, they'll even have dozens of telescopes set up to use on Monday.
NASA Astronaut Lee Morvin is here and of course, there's the countdown to totality. It's a family adventure for a front-row seat for skywatchers of this celestial event.
As you would expect, the planetarium director is more than excited.
"Astronomy is something I love," said James Bader, director of the RMSC Strasenburgh Planetarium. "I went way out of my way to see the clips in 2017. I drove from Texas to Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming just so that I could see this. I hiked for seven hours starting at three in the morning so I could see it in 2017. Today, we don't have to go anywhere. We can walk out our back doors and front doors whatever and all we have to do is look up because the path of totality is coming to us."
Watch parties are happening at parks, wineries, colleges, Syracuse Inner Harbor, Gore Mountain — you name it from Buffalo to Lake Placid.