Multiple telescopes dotted the crowd underneath the flagpoles located in front of the town office in Jackman. The town offered the longest time of totality in Maine (3 minutes and 26 seconds) and attracted thousands of interested observers. But one telescope, operated by a team of individuals calibrating their data-collection equipment, stood alone in an area marked off by caution tape.
This group in Jackman was participating in the Citizen CATE (Continental-America Telescope Eclipse) 2024 Project — a NASA-funded astronomy project aimed at studying the upper atmosphere of the sun. They were one of 35 total amateur teams across the United States collecting scientific research for the project on Monday.
"The main phase of this project began nearly two years ago," said Dr. Amir Caspi, the primary investigator for Citizen CATE 2024 and a principal scientist at the Southwest Research Institute (SWRI) in Texas. “There are other sort of ancillary science questions that we’re looking to answer. We'll hopefully be able to make new progress into understanding how the corona is heated and how the solar wind is born."
The corona forms the upper part of the sun's atmosphere. Normally the sun's surface outshines the corona, making the lower and middle parts of the corona invisible to the naked eye. Those parts are only visible during a solar eclipse — when light from the sun’s surface is blocked by the moon. But the rarity of total solar eclipses makes collecting data collection difficult. Beyond that, a solar eclipse only lasts for a few minutes at most at any given location.
Caspi and the other researchers behind the project had a solution. Instead of observing the eclipse from an observatory or a single telescope, the plan was to place dozens of observation sites along the path of totality. The sites would film the eclipse as it passed by overhead using identical telescope setups. Then afterwards the researchers would compile the footage from the different sites to create an hour-long movie to study. To staff the 35 local observation sites across the United States, researchers recruited over 200 people across the United States to staff the 35 local observation sites.
"Maine has been integral to helping to make this project a success," Caspi said. "And will be integral to whatever successful observations will be made on the day of the eclipse."
The "citizen" part of the project's name comes from the amateur astronomers primarily conducting the observations. Where one would expect to see professional researchers and grad students, the ground teams were comprised of teachers, student groups, and other amateurs simply interested in astronomy.
"Part of [the excitement] is just being able to see another total solar eclipse because they really are one of the most spectacular things in all nature," said Shawn Laatsch, the director of UMaine’s planetarium. Laatsch also led the observation site in Jackman and served as the project’s Northeast Regional Coordinator. He oversaw the teams deployed across New England — including the two other teams in Maine.
A month before the eclipse, Laatsch and UMaine Ph.D. student Nikita Saini met the two other Maine observation teams in Orono and taught them how to use the equipment. The Citizen CATE organizers gave each observation team identical equipment setups worth around $8,000. The kits included a refractor telescope, an imaging sensor and camera for making solar observations, and a laptop loaded with specialized software.
“The data for our project looks at polarized light during totality," Laatsch said. "The primary thing [we taught them was] how to get set up so that they can collect that."
Beyond the scientific goals, Citizen CATE 2024 is equally focused on increasing access to astronomy and other STEM fields within underserved communities. That's why the equipment given to the local teams is theirs to keep, even after the project ends. The coordinators hope this will provide a way for these communities to engage in astronomy and spur interest in the subject.
"The financial aspect is always a barrier," said Pedro Vázquez, a South Portland community organizer and the lead for the Citizen CATE team stationed in Houlton. Vázquez secured external grant funding which allowed some students from the South Portland School district to travel and stay in Houlton for the eclipse.
"Many families are just trying to keep a roof over their head. They don't have access to telescopes, or tech, or even the ability to get into a car to drive several hours to be in the center of the [eclipse]," Vázquez said.
The equipment is especially welcome to Kyle Leathers. Beyond serving as the team lead for the Millinocket observation site, Leathers is also a social studies teacher at Stearns Junior High in Millinocket.
"[Millinocket] is a proud community, but also pretty impoverished in a lot of ways," Leathers said. "Definitely a large portion of our population is under the poverty line, so it makes it hard [for the school] to get things that aren’t necessary. Like this astronomy equipment just would not have been on anybody’s radar to purchase."
Leathers said he plans to organize stargazing nights at the middle school over the upcoming summer break. He said there may even be enough interest to form an astronomy club amongst the students.
"There was one day where we were trying to see if we can get the equipment to work," Leathers said. "I brought it into my classroom to set it up long enough after school that all the kids were gone. But there was one kid who was still here. She was like, ‘oh, I saw the equipment. I saw the equipment. I know what you’re talking about!' She was just so surprised and amazed, so I think that's pretty cool."
The data collected by the Citizen CATE 2024 teams will be compiled in the proceeding weeks by Caspi and his team at the Southwest Research Institute.
Esta Pratt-Kielley contributed reporting to this story.
