Eclipse Chasers Follow the Sun

[caption id="attachment_67829" align="alignnone" width="800"] David Kriegsman, at right, with mom Beth and brothers Benjamin and Roger at their North Haven home on Monday. Michael Heller photo[/caption]

By Christine Sampson

The total solar eclipse is the stuff David Kriegsman's dreams are made of.

The soon-to-be fifth grader at Sag Harbor Elementary School is so fascinated by astronomy that for the annual fourth and fifth grade science fair, he pulled off a project relating the spectrum of the sun to the spectrum of the moon. He was in the second grade at the time.

Now, David has pulled off another awesome feat: He convinced his parents, Alex and Beth Kriegsman, to take him and his siblings on a trip to the Midwest so they can see the full solar eclipse on Monday. He knew his parents were leaning toward “yes,” but they delivered the news in a letter they sent him while he was at sleepaway camp earlier this month: The family will be traveling to Idaho next week, renting an RV to go camping near Pocatello to witness the natural phenomenon.

“I was very happy. It's very nice of them to take me on this great trip,” said David, who has seen five lunar eclipses so far. “I'm very excited about the eclipse. I think I'll like the totality the most because everything gets dark and stars start showing.”

The Kriegsmans, who live in North Haven, are not the only family traveling to see the full solar eclipse. Bob Wilson and Beth Barth of Sag Harbor, along with their son Mike, are traveling to Tennessee to get in on the action. Mr. Wilson said they'll be staying in Nashville, then driving several miles outside the city for the afternoon viewing session.

“I saw one in 1979 in Manitoba, Canada, and it was like, 'Wow,'” Mr. Wilson said in an interview. “That was in February, so it was freezing, but it was wonderful. You do want to see one again once you've seen one.”

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He has seen the Northern Lights, the flight of a California condor, the Grand Canyon and the Galapagos Islands.

“You can sit at home and see something on TV like a space shuttle launch and say, 'Boy, I'd like to see something like that someday,” Mr. Wilson said. “I decided years ago that I didn't have to just wish I could be there. I realized I could go. There's a mental line there of making the commitment to go see that. It's been great fun for me ever since. I don't have to just read about it or watch it on TV.”

Perhaps the South Fork's ultimate eclipse chaser is East Hampton resident Terry Kemper, for whom Monday's eclipse will be the 17th he has witnessed in totality. In an interview, Mr. Kemper said he usually travels once every 12 to 15 months to catch an eclipse somewhere around the world. He's been to faraway places like Indonesia, South Africa, Mongolia — although Monday's eclipse will keep him a little closer to home, to Redmond, Oregon.

“It's taken me on a safari, and to places one would never go,” he said. “It's been really interesting.”

Mr. Kemper chases the sun with what he dubbed a “posse” of about 10 people. It includes Olav Andrade, a former Apple developer who created the mobile app “Eclipses,” and a former NASA astronaut. They don't bring much special equipment — really just the barebones eclipse viewing gear — because often times they're seeing not just an eclipse but also the city, island or country where the eclipse has taken them.

“I don't actually take pictures, because I find NASA does a better job and you can always download pictures, so why carry 60 pounds of equipment with you?” Mr. Kemper said. “I travel light these days. I bring a couple of special eclipse glasses and a camera that goes to 600 mm telephoto, and that should do it.”

He has been following solar eclipses since his first one, in 1980.

“There's nothing like it,” he said. “It's a very mystical experience.”