All of Greater Cincinnati had the chance to see a partial solar eclipse Monday, but only some experienced the once-in-a-lifetime moment of totality.
The moment of totality in northwest Hamilton County - amazing!
— Becca Costello 📻 🤠 (@becca_costello) April 8, 2024
(Not sure why my phone was weird about the recording...) pic.twitter.com/iol8PlILuC
The path of totality included the northwest corner of Hamilton County. Great Parks hosted a watch party at Miami Whitewater Forest, drawing enough people for dead-stop traffic for about three miles outside the entrance a couple hours before totality.
A smaller group lined the fields at a soccer complex a couple miles away, including the Frecker family from Anderson.
"That was crazy," said 15-year-old Erika Frecker. "Taking off your glasses to stop looking at the sun and just see it's all dark outside. You could even see a few stars for a second there."
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Erika's sister Alejandra, 18, says she remembers the partial eclipse in 2017, but a total eclipse is something special.
"I think it's funny because you watch it in your glasses and then it's dark, and then I looked around everything and was like, 'Oh, it's dark!' and I forgot to look up," Alejandra said. "But then you actually look at it, because you can see it without the glasses, and it's pretty neat."
Totality here only lasted about 30 seconds. Others in the path witnessed the total eclipse for as long as three minutes.
That included Cleveland, where it was Opening Day at Progressive Field. Ideastream caught up with Guardians fans Landon and Luke Johnson.
"We thought it was gonna be a little more hectic than it has been," Landon said. "Were planning on having a lot of traffic, but we got up here pretty easily and got here."
Being able to see the eclipse was a bonus to attending their fourth home opener, he said.
"It's really cool to be able to watch it from the stadium."
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It wasn't a total eclipse, and the game didn't start until 6:40 p.m., but the Cincinnati Reds got a view from Great American Ball Park.
In fact, most of the area experienced a partial eclipse, reaching up to 99% totality.
Michael Kennelly is a sophomore at the University of Dayton and an electrical and computer engineering major minoring in photography. He also is president of the photography club and a member of the astronomy club, He caught a photo featuring an ultrabright flare.
Kennelly says this photo has been in the works since January, a collaboration between the astronomy club, photography club, the physics department and the department of art and design.
"I was quite nervous throughout the whole thing, but very excited to see this photograph come to fruition," he said in a release. "I'm thankful for everyone who helped make it possible."
No matter if you were in totality or not, watching the solar eclipse was likely an awe-inspiring experience.
So much so, University of California Irvine social psychology professor Paul Piff says past research suggests witnessing such events make us more social and less self-centered.
"In broad strokes, what we're finding is that experiences that bring about awe — and most predominantly really powerful, fleeting experiences like the solar eclipse — seem to attune people and connect us to one another," Piff previously told WVXU.
Another area of interest for researchers? Animal behavior.
Dr. Andrew Farnsworth of Cornell University is part of a team who wanted to know more about how animals experience it, like whether the sudden plunge into darkness caused animals to adopt their usual nocturnal habits or take up completely unexpected behaviors.
"...In my case, and my colleagues', we're thinking about sensory ecology — the ways animals perceive their world," he said.
The animals at the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden certainly got into the action. The zoo shared photos of Fiona the hippo and other animals showing off their very own "eclipse glasses" the day before the event.
