Crowds gathered at Rosslyn’s Gateway Park today (Monday) to witness the partial solar eclipse.
The sky became noticeably darker as peak eclipse approached around 3:20 p.m. Scattered applause broke out from visitors donning eclipse glasses to watch the rare celestial event. Beyond Rosslyn, another public viewing was held at the GMU campus in Virginia Square.
The eclipse reached 87% totality in Arlington on a partly cloudy day, following weeks of national hype as well as weekend events at Arlington Central Library and the David M. Brown Planetarium.
Arlington’s last solar eclipse was in 2017, and the next total solar eclipse in the contiguous United States won’t happen until 2044.