What Spanish town councils should prepare for the 2027 eclipse: figures, venue, glasses and heat

A town council in the path of totality has four things to prepare: its figures (what time totality comes and how many seconds it lasts), a place where people can watch without stopping on the roads, EN ISO 12312-2 glasses for the public, and a plan for the heat and for the journey home. There are 105 municipalities: 55 in Málaga province, 30 in Cádiz, 13 in Granada, 5 in Almería, plus Ceuta and Melilla, Spain’s two cities in North Africa. In all of them totality falls in the middle of the morning on Monday 2 August 2027, with maximum eclipse between 10:46 and 10:51 Spanish time (CEST, UTC+2). A council outside the path has almost the same list, minus the totality: there the eclipse is partial and the glasses never come off.

Your municipality’s figures

The first thing is to know what your town gets, because that is what residents will ask. The duration we publish is the one from the IGN (Spain’s National Geographic Institute), and the time of maximum is our own:

Mainland Spanish time, which is also the time in Ceuta and Melilla. Every municipality has its own page with the contact times, the IGN’s times alongside, and the Sun’s altitude: look yours up in Will I see it?. For the council website, the widget (in Spanish) is free: you search for the municipality and it gives you the code to paste, with its time and its seconds of totality.

If you are outside the path, your figure is the percentage. On the mainland, the Balearic Islands, Ceuta and Melilla, the eclipse begins at 09:40 in Ayamonte, on the Portuguese border, and ends at 12:15 in es Castell (Menorca), and outside the path the Sun is covered by anything from 72.0% in Cariño, in Galicia, to 99.9% in Almería. Without totality there is no moment without glasses, not even at 99.9%.

A Monday in August, mid-morning

It is a working day in the middle of the holiday season and, as the Trío de Eclipses website (the official eclipse site of Spain’s Ministry of Science) points out, it falls during Operación Verano, the summer traffic operation of the DGT, Spain’s traffic authority. That website asks people to avoid travelling on eclipse day, especially after maximum, and says that specific plans are being prepared for the road network, coordinated by the DGT and by the regional governments that have their own police forces.

For last summer’s eclipse, the DGT asked people to choose authorised or designated viewing points with enough parking and suitable access, and to avoid minor roads and places with limited capacity that fill up easily. It banned stopping on the hard shoulder or the carriageway to watch, and warned about pedestrians on the road near viewing points. It also announced that there could be traffic control at specific points, access restrictions, diversions and crowd-capacity checks. Inside built-up areas, Spain’s Traffic Act leaves stopping and parking to municipal by-laws (article 39), which can restrict times so that traffic is not obstructed.

Glasses for the public

Anyone looking at the Sun during the partial phases needs an EN ISO 12312-2 filter. If the council hands out or lends glasses, it helps to know three things the AAS (American Astronomical Society) says: you don’t need one pair per person, because the partial phases move slowly and a few pairs can be passed round; they must be checked beforehand, and if the filter is scratched or torn it goes in the bin; and children should always have an adult beside them.

On Order your glasses you can ask for ours: cardboard, with the EN ISO 12312-2 certificate, along with the phone filter and packs for groups. We reply with the price and the delivery time. If you would like people to be able to collect them in the town itself, local shops can sign up as pickup points and hand the glasses out to their neighbours.

Shade, water and fire

The Trío website puts the health risks of the eclipse first: heatstroke, dehydration, crowds and the effects of sudden darkness. For the public it asks for shade, sun cream and water, and it warns that events with a lot of people raise the risk of water-borne and food-borne illness, so drinking water and food must be in good condition. In the countryside, it recalls the ban on lighting fires, says cars should not park on dry vegetation and that emergency access routes must be kept clear. AEMET, Spain’s state weather agency, publishes the fire danger level every day.

No drones over the public

For last summer’s eclipse, AESA, Spain’s aviation safety agency, reminded operators that drone flights over crowds are not allowed, either in the open category or in standard scenarios, and asked people to report any improper use to the police. If the council wants to film from the air, it will need an operator who follows those rules: we cover it in drones and aircraft during the eclipse.

A keepsake with the town’s name

For official gifts, schools or local shops, through our business page (in Spanish) we prepare merchandise with the council’s logo and the municipality, and the shop has T-shirts, mugs and prints with the name of each municipality, the time of its maximum and its seconds of totality.

Sources: DGT — For the eclipse, the traffic authority recommends planning journeys, staggering the return and taking extra care at the wheel (in Spanish: designated viewing points, minor roads, hard shoulder, pedestrians, traffic control and capacity checks); BOE, Spain’s Official State Gazette — Royal Legislative Decree 6/2015, consolidated text of the Traffic Act (in Spanish: article 39, stopping and parking in built-up areas set by municipal by-law); Trío de Eclipses, official website of Spain’s Ministry of Science — Tráfico, Prevención y riesgos and Otros riesgos sanitarios (in Spanish: Operación Verano and traffic plans; health risks, fire and emergency access; shade, drinking water and food); AESA — Eclipse solar: recomendaciones para una operación aérea segura (in Spanish: drones over crowds); AAS — How to View a Solar Eclipse Safely (sharing glasses, checking them, supervising children); municipalities with totality and durations: IGN; times of maximum and percentages: eclipseando data (skyfield engine + DE440s).