Solar eclipse preparations underway across New York, Tri-State area as cloudy weather looms

ByEyewitness News WABC logo

Monday, April 8, 2024

Thousands head to Niagara Falls to witness total solar eclipse

Brittany Bell has the latest from Niagara Falls on watching the eclipse.

NEW YORK (WABC) -- While New York City and the Tri-State area will be outside the path of totality for Monday's solar eclipse, we will still be in for quite the celestial spectacle.

But will clouds spoil the show?

On Monday, some high clouds will filter in by afternoon, but we still will have a good shot at seeing the eclipse, with the moon almost covering 90 percent of the sun at 3:25 p,m. The moon will start biting into our view of the sun at 2:10 p.m., and the event will be over at 4:36 p.m.

Meteorologist Brittany Bell has started her coverage of the eclipse and all preparations from the Niagra Falls area.

Brittany Bell is covering the total solar eclipse from beautiful Niagra Falls.

We originally sent Meteorologist Lee Goldberg to Syracuse to take in the eclipse. But like the tens of thousands chasing totality, he is on the move to Burlington, Vermont.

For those chasing the total eclipse, upstate New York and New England are the places to be, but you might want to stay east of I-81 and go to the Adirondacks, where viewing conditions are expected to be best in the Empire State.

The cloud threat comes from a warm front moving across the eastern Great Lakes and interior Northeast bringing clouds and a few scattered rain showers in spots. For much of the region, the sky will feature a mixture of sunshine and clouds. There are expected to be thin, high-level clouds in the region which would act like a filter for viewing the eclipse, but not completely block it out.

The best weather conditions for viewing along the path of totality will be across northern New England, from Burlington, Vermont into Maine.

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Ultimately, the impacts that clouds could have on viewing the eclipse depend on several factors, including exact timing and what part of the sky you're looking at to see the eclipse in a specific city. The greatest confidence in viewing conditions and cloud coverage specifics doesn't occur until a few hours before the event.

You can use the interactive map from NOAA and the National Weather Service below to search for cloud cover by ZIP code or click on a dot to see the visibility probabilities for Monday's eclipse in that area.

Because of a storm over the middle of the country, some high clouds are likely to spill into places like Cleveland and Buffalo, and depending on how thick that high deck of clouds is, that could obscure viewing.

Clouds will likely also cover large swaths of the path of totality in Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.