Local leaders plan for hundreds of thousands of visitors during 2024 solar eclipse

Everyone should be prepared for the total solar eclipse that will cover North Central Ohio on Monday, April 8, 2024.

That was the message community leaders agreed upon when they met Wednesday afternoon in the emergency operations center of the Richland County Emergency Management Agency.

They were concerned because, in their opinions, not enough county residents are taking the event seriously.

"People are going to be coming here from all over the world," Jim Sweat, captain of the Richland County Sheriff's Office, told the group of leaders. "They're going to leave Richland County and they don't care what's happened."

Hundreds of thousands will visit Richland County

The event is expected to draw a potential audience of millions of viewers to the Buckeye State.

As many as 400,000 of those people could visit Richland County during the cosmic display, the captain said.

That estimate was feasible, but not quite expected, explained Rebecca Owens, director of the Richland County Emergency Management Agency.

A more conservative guess is that the county's population will double during the eclipse.

"That's another 125,000 people," Owens said. "At least."

Either way, they agreed that hundreds of thousands of people are expected to visit the region to watch the solar eclipse.

Eclipse's apex will be in North Central Ohio

The centerline of the eclipse — the middle of the shadow's path — will stretch from Texas to Maine.

The eclipse will enter western Ohio about 3:10 p.m. near the city of Greenville in Darke County, according to a NASA map.

The path of the eclipse will travel northeast, reaching Cleveland by 3:15 p.m., then Erie, Pennsylvania, by about 3:18 p.m. Viewers will see the full eclipse for nearly four minutes.

The totality viewing area will be a 124-mile wide strip angling from the southwest to northeast corners of the state.

The apex of the centerline will be in Forest, a village 35 miles west of Bucyrus in Wyandot County.

Ohio's emergency management agency has created a special website, www.eclipse.ohio.gov, dedicated to the event.

"The last total solar eclipse visible in Ohio was in 1806," the website explains. "The next total solar eclipse in Ohio will be in the year 2444."

Since the United States became a country, only 21 total solar eclipses have been visible in the lower 48 states.

'I wish the governor would declare a state of emergency'

Having anywhere from 125,000 to 400,000 extra people in Richland County for even just one day poses a plethora of issues, the community leaders agreed.

The travelers will overwhelm the streets and highways, making travel times unimaginably long. The sheriff's office has recommended that schools, employers and any all non-emergency entities shut down for the day.

The guests will purchase food and other supplies, potentially depleting resources for lengthy periods of time. The EMA suggests that anyone who has medical needs stock up in advance in case needed items run out.

Sewage systems and cellular phone towers will be inundated with at least double the normal amount of activity, which could lead to unexpected consequences.

"The volunteer fire agencies are going to have the biggest problems," Sweat said. "I wish the governor would declare a state of emergency for that day."

'They're going to be busy'

Law enforcement agencies countywide are already trying to schedule officers from the southern part of Ohio to come work special detail the weekend of the eclipse to help with security.

"Everywhere they're going to be busy," Sweat said.

Bellville Mayor Teri Brenkus told the group her village already has booked portable toilets during the event. It's possible other municipalities might need to have them shipped in from out of state for the event.

It was determined that many local hotels already have booked rooms at more than $900 per night, many times higher than their normal rate.

List of public viewing areas to be compiled

The county website will contain a special information page about the eclipse that will go live in October, according to Tony Vero, county commissioner.

One of the features on that page will be a map of local viewing locations. The question, though, was how many to list and which ones.

Vero pointed out that restrooms and security will be the responsibility of individual host entities. That means, he explained, that visitors at a high school football stadium will cost money to that school district, those at a park will cost money to whatever governmental body owns that park, and so on.

"The county commissioners aren't paying for it all," Vero said.

The group decided it would be best to ask cities, villages, townships, school districts and the state what areas they would like advertised as public viewing areas during next spring's total eclipse.

ztuggle@gannett.com

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This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Hundreds of thousands of visitors expected during 2024 solar eclipse