A small and hopeful group of sky gazers gathered at Bethel Heritage Park in Winkler Monday afternoon, trying to get a glimpse of the solar eclipse.
The Pembina Valley Astro Club’s Kenton Dyck had his high-tech telescope outfitted with solar filters to allow people to safely watch as the moon partially blocked the sun in the sky.
While parts of North America were treated to a total eclipse—the last visible one of its kind in Canada until 2044—Manitobans got to see only a partial one this time around. The last time our province was in the path of a total solar eclipse was 1979.
Unfortunately, cloudy weather foiled viewing plans in Winkler, though it didn’t put too much of a damper on everyone’s enthusiasm.
“I am pretty excited at the level of interest,” Dyck said. “I think we’ve had 50-60 people come by already.”
Among them was John Thiessen, who borrowed a pair of eclipse glasses from Dyck and had his eyes firmly planted on the skies in the hopes the clouds would clear, if even for a few seconds.
“I saw the partial eclipse in 2017,” he shared. “It was impressive.”
The chance, however small, to replicate the experience was one he wasn’t going to pass up.
“It’s exciting. There’s so many people here to watch God’s marvelous creation doing its thing.”
The early birds that day did get a few brief peeks at the sun as the moon began to inch its way across it just before 1 p.m., but persistent cloud cover had attendees looking up at grey skies for most of the two-hour event.
“The clouds are not necessarily behaving … it wouldn’t be any fun if it was easy, but does it have to be this much fun?” Dyck joked. “However, when we started we got to see the first 20 minutes or so, which were actually really cool.”
Seeing so many people come out for the show has Dyck feeling pretty optimistic about future viewing parties the club is planning in the months ahead, including setting its sights on a rare recurring nova and the 12P/Pons-Brooks comet.
“As soon as the weather is warm enough that we know we won’t freeze at night again, then we’ll start having regular events,” he said. “As soon as that happens, we’ll start having events every other week again.”
Dyck encourages astronomy buffs to follow @astroclubpv on Instagram or the South Central Regional Library Winkler Branch social media accounts to hear about upcoming public viewing parties.
