Mondays total eclipse is being hailedquite deservedlyas a once-in-a-lifetime event.
Remote towns with hundreds of residents are bracing for thousands and even tens of thousands of eclipse-hungry tourists.
Don’t do it.
LeoPatrizi / Getty Images
Trust me; I speak from experience.
I havent stared at the sun.
But I did look at aUV lamponce.
For a matter of seconds.
And what happened next was one of the most painful experiences of my life.
At the time, I was a naive graduate student anxious about my research and desperate for results.
One step in the sequencing process requires you to check your work with a UV light.
Normally this is done with the help of a fancy camera.
I was young and impatient.
“Just a few seconds,” I thought.
“What could be the harm?”
So I turned on the UV light, opened the hood, and peeked.
It wasnt until several hours later that my boyfriend at the time started asking if I was OK.
Your eyes look really red, he noted.
Then my vision started to get blurry and my eyes began to hurt.
Discomfort turned into pain, and pain turned into agony.
By 10 P.M., my eyes were swollen shutand the pain was unbearable.
Let me put it this way: I gave birth to my first child two months ago.
On her way out of my body, she caused a partial third-degree tear of my perineum.
The eyes were worse.
Opening my eyes wasnt an option.
Even with them closed, I felt like my inner eyelids were coated in sandpaper.
Thats when I learned just how quickly you might burn your eyes by looking at a UV light.
The sun is a giant UV light.
But, again, no.
Remember when you used to burn ants with a magnifying glass?"
“That is the same thing that happens to your eye when you stare at the sun.
But, unlike the damage that I had, solar damage to the retina is permanent.
The damage is permanent, central, and in both eyes…and theres no treatment.
So she and her colleagues are bracing for a swath of patients with eye complications related to the eclipse.
However, recentAmazon recallshave some consumers worried that their purchased spectacles arent up to snuff.
There are some bogus eclipse-viewing glasses out there, and that is a concern, said Dr. Heisman.
The glasses should be very darkalmost like nighttime, she explained.
Regular sunglasses are not nearly dark enough to view the eclipse with.
Thissite from the American Astronomical Societylists reputable vendors to see to it yours are reliable.
(Check outthis NASA tutorialto make one out of paper and foil.)
Similarly, anything that casts small shadows will create incredible patterns as the moon blocks out the sun.
Looking at the shadows of leaves on a tree, for example, can be downright magical.
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