The moon's dark shadow swept across the United States in a total solar eclipse on Monday, thrilling millions of spectators with a Great American Solar Eclipse.
Science.com reported that the total eclipse was the first in nearly a century to cast the moon's shadow on the entire US - the last one was in 1918.
The moon's shadow crossed 14 states, from Oregon to South Carolina, along a path that is home to 12.2 million people, NASA officials said.
The Independent reported that as the moon slowly turned the sun over New York City into a crescent — creeping toward a partial eclipse— the crowd at the American Museum of Natural History occasionally burst into premature applause.
Staring up through silver-lensed glasses made special to block direct sunlight, thousands of people craned their necks to view the eclipse.
It didn’t matter, though. The eclipse was being billed as a once-in-a-lifetime event, reported The Independent.
“I haven’t experienced an eclipse in a very long time,” Greg Packer, a retired highway worker, told The Independent.
“I remember [watching a solar eclipse] from my childhood,” Sharnette Johnson, 36, said.
Another 200 million Americans were within a day's drive of totality, with tourists also flying in from other states and countries, The Independent reported.
"I think this will be recorded as, to date, the most-viewed eclipse in history," Lou Mayo, a NASA planetary scientist seeing his first total solar eclipse, told reporters.