Kansas Business Gears Up For Eclipse Rush
BANNER CREEK (CBS) -- The Banner Creek Science Center and Observatory is always looking toward the stars. Exploring. Learning, and enjoying the pure beauty of the night sky.
But on August 21st, northeast Kansas will go dark -- for just over 2 minutes.
"It's very rare in the United States," said Mike Ford, a solar eclipse enthusiast. "This one is going to criss-cross the United States from the northwest to the southeast."
Ford is a volunteer at the Observatory, but has started up a business for the rare event called EclipseStuff dot com.
The business sells safety glasses so those who want to watch the eclipse can do it without going blind. But they are also making the event more special by offering a day trip, to help reduce the amount of traffic predicted to be on the highways.
"We're mainly doing it for safety," Ford said.
Mike's Observatory is selling tickets for anyone to take a bus to an area that will see complete darkness, feed them lunch, have an expert from NASA speak, and provide viewers everything the need to have a safe and memorable experience.
"Probably 75 north is going to be congested. 36, east/west is going to be congested. That's why the U.S. Department of Transportation is saying stay off the highways," he said "I guarantee once you see it, you'll want to keep going to them."
But something like this won't cross the plains for a long time.
"It's going to be 7 years, but you're going to have to travel about 600 miles to see totality," he said.