Total solar eclipse live updates: millions watched rare spectacle as moon blocked sun in Mexico, US and Canada | Solar eclipses

Caitlin Ray, an 11th grader from El Paso, was on a campus visit at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas just in time for totality.

On campus, students and families from the surrounding neighborhoods filled the campus’s main square to stare skyward. Ray said she hopes to study astronomy, and was excited about the scientific possibilities the eclipse offers.

“I’m especially excited to see the corona and see if it’s going to be circular,” Ray said.

If it is, that means there is a lot of solar activity, and there is a lot of research that can come from it.

Clouds blocked the sun for much of the partial eclipse, but — as elsewhere in North Texas — parted just before totality. Along with oohs and aahs, people cheered and sang God Bless America. Nikhil Kathuria, an SMU junior studying finance, said:

It was one of the most incredible things I have ever seen.

Millions of people in 15 US states, and in Mexico and Canadawitnessed the rare and ethereal spectacle of a total solar eclipse on Monday, with cities plunged into sudden darkness and experiencing a sharp drop in temperatures.

• It was North America’s first total eclipse since 2017. The next coast-to-coast total eclipse in the US is in 2045.

• The solar eclipse fell on Mexico’s Pacific coast at 11:07 a.m. PT. Mexico’s beach resort town of Mazatlno was the first major lookout along the path of totality.

• Clouds have the most of Texas when the total solar eclipse began its path across the US. The weather cooperated at the last minute just east of Dallas and near Austin, where crowds cheered and whistled as the clouds parted in the final minutes before totality.

• The path of totality included many major cities, incl Dallas; Indianapolis; Cleveland; Buffalo, New York; and Montreal. About 32 million people in the US live within the path of totality, but almost everyone in North America is guaranteed at least a partial eclipse, weather permitting.

• Almost 400 couples tied the knot in the shadow of the moon in a mass wedding event Russellville, Arkansas.

• By Niagara Fallshundreds dressed in costumes to look like the sun to see the eclipse next to the roaring waterfall.

• The moon’s shadow left the mainland of North America in Newfoundland.

Ignas Barauskas almost missed it.

He bought plane tickets from his home in Lithuania to the United States about a month ago. After a series of flight delays, he landed in Dallas around midnight, ready for a once-in-a-lifetime total solar eclipse.

“I probably wouldn’t have come to Dallas if it wasn’t for the total solar eclipse,” Barauskas said.

It looks like it’s going to be a big event, the sun hiding during the day.

On Monday morning he took public transport – because all rental cars in the city had been booked for months – to Dallas’ White Rock Lake, arriving moments before the partial eclipse began. All morning he and millions of other umbraphiles, or eclipse chasers, worried about the gloomy forecast of thick clouds.

But then, just before the total eclipse began, the clouds parted. The view of the sun’s brilliant corona left the city in pitch darkness for as much as four minutes. Barauskas said:

Everyone screamed. Like a concert.

Barauskas was among the millions who traveled to the path of totality that stretched from the west Mexico Monday to Newfoundland – much of it under lingering cloudy skies.

The Dallas-Fort Worth region was the largest metropolitan area in the path of totality for Monday’s total solar eclipse, which made north Texas an important destination and creates potential headaches for local residents. The overcast weather left some last-minute scrambling to change plans and head for clearer skies, but for much of North Texas, totality itself was clear. Barauskas said:

Better than all expectations.

Totality ended in Newfoundland, Canada, at 3:46 p.m. ET. The eclipse has now left the North American continent.

Joanna Walters

The clouds thickened as the moon passed here before the sun Saratoga Springs, in upstate New York so I was happy to have eclipse glasses with 2x magnification and could still see the orange segment of the sun become an orange sliver and eventually a fingernail as the height of the phenomenon occurred.

A dusky gloom descended over the park where a few hundred people, mostly locals, thundered skywards, and a hush descended as the shadows of people and trees grew ghostly and then disappeared into the gloom, with ‘ a few oohs and aahs.

Suddenly mosquitoes appeared and started biting, as if night was actually approaching.

It didn’t get completely dark as we are a bit out of the band of totality but it was a surreal experience and now people are rolling up their picnic blankets and going about their days as blue skies return and the clouds clear somewhat . Worth it.