ÃÛÌÒÇéÈË

On April 8, Springfield residents will have a first-row seat to watch the solar eclipse along with most of central Illinois. 

Before staring up into the black hole sun, you’ll need glasses to protect your eyesight as it takes only seconds of focus on the eclipse to cause permanent damage to your eyes and potential loss of vision. 

Don’t attempt to use regular sunglasses—they won’t work. Eclipse glasses have a solar filter built into them to give protection against the sun’s harmful rays during eclipses.

Mylar-based eclipse glasses need to meet ISO standards and according to , due to certain dealers and websites selling non-compliant glasses, it’s important to purchase from reputable manufacturers so the glasses actually work. 

include:

• American Paper Optics
• Rainbow Symphony
• Halo Eclipse Spectacles, which are reusable viewing glasses
• Thousand Oaks Optical
• DayStar Filters
• Flip'n Shades, which creates clip-ons for baseball caps

Glasses are going fast before the event but there are still plenty of places in town to look.

More Springfield:Keeping pantries and stomachs full: PBJ Springfield's approach to helping those in need

Regional North American chains tend to sell eclipse-viewing glasses before the solar event, so Springfield residents are most likely going to find the glasses at these locations before they sell out:

• Hy-Vee on South MacArthur Boulevard
• Lowes on Wabash Avenue
• Both Walmart Supercenters on Freedom Drive and Lejune Drive
• Casey’s General Stores across town 
• Circle K’s across town
• Best Buy on South Veterans Parkway

Lincoln Library on South 7th Street has free eclipse glasses, but their limited quantity are first come first serve, with one pair per person.

For the second time in several years, the moon will pass directly in front of the sun and turn the sky dark as night, in a phenomenon known as a total eclipse. There are two to five solar eclipses each year, but total eclipse only happens every 18 months somewhere on the globe.

Springfield will have a partial eclipse which will start at 12:45 p.m. and last until 3:18, with a peak at 2:02 p.m.; Carbondale in Illinois will have a total eclipse lasting four minutes and nine seconds.

What makes a total eclipse special is only people in the line of the moon’s shadow will be able to see the total eclipse; as the earth rotates the position of the moon's shadow changes on earth. 

Claire Grant reports business with the State Journal-Register: CLGrant@gannett.com; X (Formerly known as Twitter): @Claire_Granted