Dear Tom,
We sometimes have partial eclipses of the sun in Chicago, but when are we going to have a total eclipse?
— Lynn Cook
Dear Lynn,
A solar eclipse occurs when the moon is coincidentally positioned in space between the Earth and the sun. The face of the moon is large enough to block the sun completely, and when the linear alignment occurs, viewers in a small location will experience a total eclipse. Larger surrounding areas will experience a partial eclipse. Astronomer Dan Joyce said the next total solar eclipse in the immediate Chicago area will happen in 2099, but it will just miss the city limits. It does cross Lake and McHenry counties and far northern Cook County. Illinois has two totality tracks in the relatively near future, one in 2017 and another in 2024, and both cross southern Illinois.
