Perhaps nothing captures the hysteria over Monday’s solar eclipse than the things Americans were looking up on Google in the hours that followed.
According to Google Trends data, several search terms related to vision problems spiked in popularity Monday afternoon around 3 p.m. Eastern Time – right around the time the eclipse passed over the US’s east coast.
The searches included terms like “my eyes hurt,” “vision loss,” and “I can’t see” – all symptoms that could arise if the eclipse-watcher didn’t wear specially-designed protective eyewear.
But if Americans were feeling any strange symptoms after the eclipse, there’s a good chance they were unrelated to the eclipse. According to PreventBlindness.org, it could take hours or even days after an eclipse before retinal damage becomes apparent.
Check out some of the search terms that spiked after the eclipse:
Het bericht These graphs show how much Americans were freaking out about vision loss after the eclipse verscheen eerst op Business Insider.