DALLAS — The eclipse rush has begun in North Texas. We’re seeing it on the highways and at both airports.
Tens of thousands of people have started making their way to the metroplex despite Monday’s eclipse forecast.
“It's going to be cloudy. So we were thinking about, or we thought about going to Vermont, and some people had said that if they wanted to switch flights and switch their car rental would be like $8,000 to change everything,” said Dan Votnick.
A price tag too high for him and his friends who flew in from Boston.
“We've been budgeting this; this hat I’m wearing is a ‘you need a budget hat,’ so it's been two years of putting money aside to make sure we could pay for everything,” Votnick said.
There’s no tally yet on just how many people are coming to North Texas this weekend. But we do know hotels are reaching capacity. In downtown Dallas, they’re already 99% sold out. Airbnb says it’s 90% booked, and prices for what’s left are sky high. And if you’re looking for a rental car, good luck.
“The last time I checked was it's like maybe a day or two ago. The lowest one was probably about like $700 something if you could even find a car,” said Eric Hanton, who flew in from Virginia.
It’s a lot of money to spend without a guaranteed view.
“We saw it’s supposed to thunderstorm but we're hoping that's not the case that we still have visibility,” said Laura Green, who flew in with her daughters and husband from Portland, Oregon.
Unfortunately, the latest weather models don’t look great. They show the best glimpse of totality in Texas might just be from one of the flights offering the view from the skies.
“The pilots will be very creative and turn the airplane left and right to look at the eclipse,” said retired commercial pilot Richard Levy. “It's called banking. They’ll tilt the aircraft at an angle of 20 or 30 degrees, nothing more. So the passengers in the aisles and the other window seats will be able to get a view.”
Another advantage is by plane; passengers will be traveling at speeds around 400 mph, while the eclipse moves at about quadruple that pace at 1,600 mph. That translates to potentially getting a longer view.
“Those experiencing it in the sky could get an extra couple of minutes, maybe 6 1/2 minutes from an airplane versus those of us on planet Earth,” Levy said.
As of Friday evening, there were still seats available on at least one of the eclipse flights departing from North Texas. Southwest flight 1252 from Love Field to Pittsburgh along the line of totality had a seat going for $660.