Solar Eclipse Paths and Cloud Fractions: October

Seeing a solar eclipse is magnificent regardless of whether or not it is cloudy; however, if the sky is clear of clouds, the sun will be fully visible and thus the experience fully realized.

Your supreme autumn day may include a free and spectacular show in the contiguous United States. Watch the sun temporarily cast a ringlike shadow upon the fall leaves as the annular eclipse path crosses from Oregon through Texas.

This dataset shows cloud fraction average in October over a recent ten year period. Cloud fraction is the percentage of each pixel of satellite imagery that is covered in clouds. Looking at a ten year average of cloudiness in October allows us to see what the likelihood is of the solar eclipse occurring on a cloudy day.

Remember, an eclipse is always worth seeing regardless of whether it is a cloudy day or not. Also, this shows the past ten years of clouds in October, not a forecast of clouds for that day. Check the National Weather Service forecast about seven days before for a better idea of what is expected to happen.

April average monthly cloud data for the last 10 years was obtained from NASA Earth Observations and averaged using ArcGIS Pro (for a free alternative use QGIS). The eclipse path was obtained from NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio and edited using Adobe Illustrator. The final video was made using Shotcut, a free and open source video editing software.