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THERMOPOLIS – Tuesday evening the Thermopolis Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce held the first of many public meetings at the Big Horn Federal Bank about the upcoming total solar eclipse, Aug. 21, to cover the basics of what was occurring, predicted visitors and the impact on the community.

“This is sort of a preliminary meeting, working out all the scenarios, all the things that can occur, logistical matters that we are going to have to address,” Hot Springs County Emergency Management Coordinator Bill Gordon said.

“Our goal tonight is to start educating the public about everybody coming,” Thermopolis Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Meri Ann Rush added.

During the meeting Gordon explained to attendees that there is no way to accurately predict the number of people who would be coming into the area to view the, for many, once-in-a-lifetime event. “It is on record over and over again, worldwide that when these events have occurred around the world a lot of people came. A lot, come and in some cases overrun communities, so that’s where we are putting our emphasis,” Gordon stated. “We are going to prepare for the worst and hope for the best,” he added.

Rush, using the prediction measures that Casper used during the governor’s conference last week, estimated that around 4,500 people could be expected starting a few days before the total solar eclipse until the day after. “What they did is take all of their hotel rooms, camp sites, vacation rentals and multiplied it by three. So I did that for Thermopolis, and so accommodation wise, that would come up to 1,335 people staying overnight. Casper went one step further because everybody who has a home will have a relative coming to stay, so they took every home and multiplied it by two. Hot Springs County has 1,579 homes, so right there, that is almost 3,000 people. So if you add that together we are at close to 4,500 people coming to Thermopolis,” Rush stated.

Having that many people come to Thermopolis will generate a drain on the community’s resources and Gordon stated that they are trying to plan for every issue that may or may not come up. Food and fuel shortages, public restrooms, internet service and cellular crashes were some of the concerns discussed. Also discussed was how the hospital and rescue services were preparing for high numbers of heat-related emergencies and rattlesnake bites.

Fire was another issue that was touched upon by Bureau of Land Management Worland Field Office Manager Mike Phillips. “In August last year we had fires up the ying yang, so with that many folks around, we really need to be paying attention to what’s going on. Our fire folks get stretched really thin across the country, so it’s pretty easy to start a fire that could be small and end up turning fairly expensive. I will just use the Twin Lakes Fire as an example, that ended up being $8 million for something that started out as just a couple acres,” Phillips said. So it’s having that mind set and planning up front that is so important, he added.

Gordon stated that each county affected by the eclipse will be responsible for their own issues. “State wide there are 12 counties that are affected. The approach in those counties is that the solar eclipse is considered a local event. The reason for that is because in all the counties we are not going to have much access to resources from outside our county. They are all going to be in the same boat, they are all going to be dealing with the same problems, so the idea of calling in fire resources and law enforcement resources, or whatever it may be is somewhat limited, so we are pretty much on our own. It is a local event,” he explained.

The 12 counties affected are: Teton, Lincoln, Sublette, Fremont, Hot Springs, Natrona, Carbon, Converse, Albany, Platte, Niobrara and Goshen.

Thermopolis falls in the band of totality, which is the area where the eclipse can be viewed in its entirety. “Totality will be at about 11:40 a.m. While we are on the edge of totality we will indeed have totality. Casper will roughly have 2 minutes and 20 seconds of total coverage of the sun, in Thermopolis we will have about 53 seconds of total coverage. We will start to see the moon crossing in front of the sun about 10:20 that morning,” Gordon said.

Among other things discussed were permits for the commercial usage of BLM land, food and lodging permits and a hot line to be created to answer non-emergency calls about the eclipse, town resources etc. to free up 911 and dispatch for real emergencies.

Anyone with questions or concerns is free to call Meri Ann Rush at the Chamber. Rush stated that if she doesn’t have the answers that she will be able to get the answers to most questions and concerns and that there will be many more public meetings before the event occurs on Aug. 21.