While New Yorkers across the state — and Americans across a large swath of the country — prepare for the total solar eclipse that will black out the sun for several minutes next month, there is one population that will not get a chance to see the rare occurrence: the inmates currently being held in the state's 44 prisons.
The eclipse is expected to sweep across much of the country on April 8, cutting through chunks of upstate New York. Residents of cities including Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse can expect to experience a total blackout for 1 ½ to 3 ½ minutes, shortly after 3 p.m.
"The April 8 eclipse is a once in a generation experience, and there's no better place to view it than in our beautiful state," New York's Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a statement on Monday.
"New York is ready to welcome millions of visitors, and my administration has been working hard to ensure everyone in the path of the eclipse can safely enjoy this rare event. I encourage anyone traveling for this experience to plan on arriving early to their destination and staying late to enjoy all of what our state has to offer."
For more than 30,000 New Yorkers, however, viewing the eclipse will be an impossibility. New York's Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) has planned a state-wide lockdown during the event — in the spite of the fact that they're also planning to distribute eclipse glasses to inmates, Hell Gate NYC reported.
DOCCS Acting Commissioner Daniel Martuscello III issued a March 11 memo explaining that the system shutdown was "a proactive approach to ensure the safety of staff, visitors, and the incarcerated population, and to ensure the integrity of our facilities during this event," according to Hell Gate NYC.
The state's prison system argues that the period of darkness constitutes a safety threat - even though all the prisons have electricity and roughly half are outside the path of totality.
"It will be 20 years before another opportunity like this exists," David Haigh, a Seventh Day Aventist, who is one of several incarcerated people who are requesting religious freedom exemptions to view the eclipse, told Hell Gate NYC. "I don't believe that just because I am incarcerated that I should be denied this opportunity, especially when this eclipse is scheduled to happen during normal outside recreation time."
On social media, writer Brendan O'Connor connected today's incarcerated New Yorkers to inmates at Attica Prison during its infamous and deadly 1971 uprising. During the first night of the rebellion, one elderly inmate reportedly stood outside and looked at the sky, telling others that he hadn't "seen the stars in twenty-two years."
During the 2017 eclipse, Muslim inmates "congregated and prayed in the prison yard peacefully and uninterrupted," Woodbourne Correctional Facility resident Jean Desmarat told the outlet.
As of right now, just one incarcerated person has gotten an exemption to view the eclipse. Jeremy Zielinski, an atheist, successfully argued that an astronomical marvel like the eclipse has special significance to those who deeply value science. He believes, however, that observance should be a possibility for people of all faiths and no faith.
"To be able to put aside our differences and just enjoy something together is really, really important," Zielinski told HellGate NYC. "There's not that many opportunities to do it, especially in a place like this. When you have an opportunity like that, it's a shame to waste it."
