A note to the procrastinators among us in North America: If you miss out on today’s total solar eclipse, your next chance to watch daylight plunge into darkness midday will be in April 2024.
The path of the eclipse in 2024 will slice diagonally through North America, from the southwest to the northeast, vanishing into the Atlantic Ocean after passing over Newfoundland, according to NASA.
READ MORE: Everything Canadians need to know about the 2017 solar eclipse
The projected path will mean people in parts of southern Ontario, southern Quebec, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and Newfoundland and Labrador will be able to witness “totality” of the eclipse.
Relatively, waiting less than seven years for another chance to see a total solar eclipse isn’t so bad. The last one prior to today’s was more than 38 years ago, on Feb. 26, 1979.
Still, Monday’s eclipse is special – even though total solar eclipses are visible somewhere on Earth about every year and a half, according to NASA.
WATCH: Everything you need to know about the solar eclipse
The last time the “path of totality” – basically, the path along which people can see the total eclipse, rather than partial – passed exclusively through the continental United States was in June 1257. The next time people in the U.S. get those bragging rights will be in January 2316, according to the American space agency.
That 2024 eclipse? Sure, lots of people in the States will be able to catch a glimpse, but not in nearly as many places as today’s.
WATCH: What amateur astronomers need to know about the solar eclipse
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