Can i stare at a solar eclipse

For these people, the only solution is working with an eye doctor to adapt to life without central vision. Additional consequences of retinal damage caused by looking at a solar eclipse are distorted vision and altered color vision.

The only safe way to look at a solar eclipse at any time other than totality is by wearing eclipse glasses, which filter out UV radiation. There are also devices you can buy or build — such as a pinhole projector — which allow you to safely view the shadow of the eclipse.

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Back to All Insights. Advancements in Treating Diabetic Eye Disease. And, yes, you could go blind. Looking directly at the powerful brightness of the sun can cause damage to the retina, the light-sensitive part of the eye. Christopher Quinn, president of the American Optometric Association. A slacker's guide to the solar eclipse. The retina may translate light into an electrical impulse that the brain understands, but one thing it can't translate to your brain is pain.

So even if you're excited about the eclipse and think one brief glimpse at the sun before it completely hides behind the moon is worth it -- it's not. There's no internal trigger that is going to let you know that you've looked at the sun for too long. Any amount of looking at it is too long. Even the smallest amount of exposure can cause blurry vision or temporary blindness. The problem is, you won't know whether it's temporary.

Why you need eclipse glasses. No matter how cute or fancy they may be, wearing your favorite pair of sunglasses -- or a whole stack of sunglasses, for any MacGyver wannabes out there -- won't help. You'll need eclipse glasses, which are regulated by an international safety standard.

They're cheap and widely available, and some libraries are even providing them free. Whether you use the cardboard eclipse glasses or a handheld card with a single rectangular view, the most important feature is the filter. The road to watching this summer's solar eclipse starts in the library? Unsafe eclipse glasses bearing the ISO logo and certification label have been flooding the market, according the astronomical society. Websites are also displaying false results that claim to show positive test results for glasses they sell.

The organization has a list it keeps updated. To test for safety, the only thing you can see through a safe solar filter is the sun itself. If you look through and the sun is too bright, out of focus or surrounded by a murky haze, or if you can see things like ordinary household lights, the glasses aren't safe.

If you're tempted to reuse eclipse glasses that are three years or older, they were made before the international safety standard was in place and come with a warning that says you can't look through them for more than three minutes at a time.

These should be discarded, according to the astronomical society. Eclipse glasses can be worn over regular eyeglasses, as well. Viewing safety. If you plan on watching the eclipse through a camera, a telescope or binoculars, buy a solar filter to place on the end of the lens. But do not wear eclipse glasses while looking through any of these. Binoculars do enable you to have an up-close view of the wonders of the eclipse, Fienberg said. Cheap solar filters are available to place on the binoculars, and you may remove them during totality, when the sun is completely blocked from view.

Where to see the solar eclipse. Want to go old school and look through welding filters? Make sure they are Shade 12, 13 or 14 -- although some people say Shade 12 leaves the sun too bright and Shade 14 makes the sun too dim, which leaves only the hard-to-find Shade 13 as the Goldilocks filter.

Know that most welders' helmets that might be lying around in garages probably won't have those filters. Here are safety tips to remember, according to the American Astronomical Society:. Always inspect your solar filter before use; if it's scratched, punctured, torn or otherwise damaged, discard it. Read and follow any instructions printed on or packaged with the filter.

Always supervise children using solar filters. If you normally wear eyeglasses, keep them on. Put your eclipse glasses on over them, or hold your handheld viewer in front of them.

Stand still and cover your eyes with your eclipse glasses or solar viewer before looking up at the bright sun. Research also suggests that while a lot of the damage may heal, some may be permanent. One study followed 58 patients who sustained eye damage after viewing a eclipse in Turkey. Healing occurred during the first month after the eclipse, the researchers reported in the journal Graefe's Archive for Clinical and Experimental Ophthalmology, but by 18 months, whatever damage remained was permanent up to 15 years later.

So, while it might be tough to go totally blind by looking at an eclipse, doing so without proper protection could leave a long-lasting stain on your vision. The only safe way to view an eclipse , according to NASA, is to use specially designed sun filters, often available at telescope stores, or to wear No.

Pinhole viewers — essentially a hole in a piece of cardboard or paper — can also be used to view the eclipse indirectly by casting a shadow of the sun on the ground or on a screen. If you don't have certified eclipse viewers, you can also make a pinhole camera viewer that will allow you to see the eclipse without looking at the sun directly.

Originally published on Live Science. Stephanie Pappas is a contributing writer for Live Science covering topics from geoscience to archaeology to the human brain and behavior. A freelancer based in Denver, Colorado, she also regularly contributes to Scientific American and The Monitor, the monthly magazine of the American Psychological Association.

Stephanie received a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of South Carolina and a graduate certificate in science communication from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Live Science.