Partial solar eclipse to be visible in some parts of the US this summer
A global map of the shadow path for the August 12, 2026, total solar eclipse. (NASA)
(NEW YORK) — Some lucky stargazers in the United States will have an opportunity to catch a glimpse of the next solar eclipse, according to astronomy experts.
On Aug. 12, a partial solar eclipse will be visible from some parts of the U.S., from Alaska to North Carolina, according to NASA. Most of Canada, much of Europe and northwestern Africa will also be able to see the partial eclipse, according to NASA.
Those in the U.S. and southern Canada will only see a small “bite” taken out of the solar disk as the moon clips the sun, NASA said.
But the full show — a total solar eclipse — will pass over the Arctic Ocean, Greenland, Iceland, Atlantic Ocean, Portugal and northern Spain, according to the National Solar Observatory.
A sunset eclipse will even be visible for viewers along the western part of the eclipse path, from mainland Europe to Africa, according to NASA. A sunset solar eclipse occurs when the sun is setting while still partially eclipsed.
After Aug. 12, the next total solar eclipse will be visible on Aug. 2, 2027, in southern Spain and North Africa.
The difference between a total and partial solar eclipse
A total solar eclipse occurs when the moon slips in front of the sun. Viewers located in the center of the moon’s shadow then experience a total solar eclipse, according to NASA. The moment of totality is when the moon completely covers the sun.
A partial solar eclipse occurs when watchers are inside the moon’s shadow but outside the path of totality, according to NASA.
When the solar eclipse will occur
In the U.S., the maximum of the partial solar eclipse will occur in Anchorage at 8:21 a.m. local time but midday on the mainland. The maximum will occur in Bangor, Maine, at 1:53 p.m.; in Boston at 1:55 p.m.; in Detroit at 1:36 p.m.; in New York City at 1:54 p.m.; and in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., at 1:53 p.m., according to NASA.
The total solar eclipse will occur at midday in a small, remote region of northern Russia. From Greenland to Iceland, totality will occur from late afternoon to early evening.
In Spain and northwestern Portugal, the sun will be fully eclipsed during the late evening, shortly before sunset, according to NASA. A sunset solar eclipse is a “rare spectacle,” according to Space.com.
How to watch the eclipse safely
Anyone who plans to watch the partial solar eclipse will need safe solar viewing glasses to protect their eyes, according to NASA.
UV radiation, whether from natural sunlight or artificial rays indoors, can damage the surface tissue, cornea and lens of the eye, according to the American Academy of Ophthalmology.
The only time viewers can look directly at the eclipse without eye protection is during the brief moments of totality, when the moon completely covers the sun. It is never safe to look directly at a partial solar eclipse without eye protection.
Viewers can also use handheld solar viewers and other safe solar filters that block out most of the Sun’s light and prevent eye damage.
An indirect viewing method, such as a pinhole projector to cast images of the Sun, can also be used to see the partial phases of the eclipse, NASA said. The device has a small opening that projects an image of the Sun onto a nearby surface.
It is not safe to look at the eclipse through a camera lens, telescope, binoculars, or any other optical device while wearing eclipse glasses or using a handheld solar viewer because the concentrated solar rays could burn through the filter and cause serious eye injury, NASA said.
Jeffrey Epstein is seen in a photo released by the New York State Division of Criminal Justice. (New York State Sex Offender Registry)
(WASHIGTON) — Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime executive secretary Lesley Groff told the House Oversight Committee Tuesday that the convicted sex offender was a “master manipulator” and that she was unaware of his crimes, according to her prepared opening remarks and multiple sources familiar with her closed-door testimony.
Groff appeared as part of the committee’s ongoing inquiry into the federal government’s handling of investigations into Epstein and his alleged co-conspirators, which to date has included interviews with former Attorney General Pam Bondi, Epstein’s longtime personal assistant Sarah Kellen, and a prison guard who was on duty the night Epstein died in his jail cell.
In her prepared opening remarks, Groff said she hoped her testimony would “dispel the false notions” that she “knowingly enabled or conspired with him to commit his evil acts.”
“Nothing could be further from the truth,” Groff said, according to a copy of the remarks shared with ABC News.
Groff said that since Epstein’s arrest in 2019, she has struggled to sleep and eat, been the target of harassment and death threats, and been “shunned” by many of her friends and acquaintances.
Groff, who worked for Epstein in New York for more than 18 years, was once described by her boss as an “extension of my brain.”
She was one of four women listed as potential co-conspirators in Epstein’s controversial non-prosecution agreement in 2007, which she said, “remains her scarlet letter.”
“I am not a conspirator and I never would have agreed to this language,” Groff said in her prepared testimony.
Among her job requirements were scheduling Epstein’s frequent meetings with celebrities, scientists and politicians, booking Epstein’s daily massage appointments when he was in New York, and arranging travel for women linked to Epstein.
Groff said she was told when hired that Epstein’s typical day included a morning muffin, yoga and a massage. She said she made daily massage appointments for Epstein, but “never met any of the masseuses” and never heard from these women or from anyone else that they were minors or that they were sexually abused.
Groff also told lawmakers Tuesday that she never had a romantic or sexual relationship with Epstein and said the message appointments she scheduled for Epstein with young women and girls were with massage therapists, a source said.
Groff could not recall scheduling massages for anyone other than Epstein and former Goldman Sachs chief counsel Kathy Ruemmler at a spa, and said the masseuses were both male and female, sources said. She testified that she would receive the names of the massage therapists from Epstein, and that he instructed her to schedule the massages.
Sources said Groff told lawmakers that she scheduled most of the massages for Epstein’s New York residence. Groff testified that she never witnessed or knew of any sexual abuse.
Groff testified that she never met a single massage therapist in person and believes that Epstein — or Bella Klein, a one-time Epstein associate — would pay them with “petty cash,” sources said. Groff told lawmakers that she would occasionally send cash via couriers, said sources.
Groff said that from the moment she was hired in 2001, Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell “established guardrails” and made it clear that she was replaceable.
She said she was told never to associate with their friends.
“Their business was none of my business,” she said she was told. She recalled that she was once “torched” by Epstein after he found out she had attended a party with one of his contacts, but he stopped short of firing her.
“In hindsight, I wish he had fired me,” she said.
Groff explained that she did not leave her job with Epstein after his arrest in 2006, because Epstein lied to her and “insisted that he had been blackmailed and set up,” she said in her prepared remarks.
“It was a shakedown, he claimed, for money,” she said. “In my mind, that was the reasons that he was treated so leniently by law-enforcement for such a serious crime.”
She described her now-deceased former boss as a “master manipulator and deceiver who separated his legitimate life from his secret life as an abuser” and made sure “those two worlds did not collide.”
“Members of the Committee, my heart breaks for these women. I believe them,” Groff said in concluding her opening remarks. “Words cannot express how badly I feel that I was employed by Mr. Epstein during the time he abused these women. I will live with this horrible feeling for the rest of my life. But what I cannot and should not live with are the false innuendos and accusations that I knowingly aided his evil conduct.”
Last September at a press conference in front of the U.S. Capitol, Epstein survivor Marina Lacerda specifically called out Groff, alleging that Groff had called her so many times to go to Epstein’s place for a massage that she dropped out of high school before the ninth grade.
Lacerda — who was one of the key witnesses that led to Epstein’s 2019 indictment for child sex trafficking — told ABC News in an interview this week that Groff was the conduit to Epstein.
“Anything that had to do with Jeffrey Epstein,” Lacerda told ABC News in an interview, “had to go through Lesley Groff.”
Michael Bachner, a lawyer for Groff, declined comment in advance of her appearance on Capitol Hill. He previously told ABC News that Groff “never knowingly booked travel for anyone under the age of 18, and had no knowledge of the alleged illegal activity whatsoever.”
“Ms. Groff, a parent herself, is incredibly shocked and deeply upset about the alleged wrongdoings of Mr. Epstein,” Bachner said.
After Epstein’s arrest in July 2019, federal prosecutors in New York included Groff in a list of potential co-conspirators and sent her a subpoena. Bachner informed the government, just four days after Epstein’s arrest, that his client “would invoke her Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled self-incrimination” if called to appear before a grand jury.
Prosecutors informed her lawyers that “numerous victims [of Epstein] had indicated that she was responsible for scheduling massages during which they were sexually abused,” and that she should consider cooperating with the investigation, according to DOJ records released in response to the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
Groff, now 59, eventually interviewed with the investigators two years later, telling prosecutors that “making massage appointments was just another appointment she had to make” for Epstein, and said that scheduling massages was “around 1%” of her job.
Groff, who was hired by Epstein in 2001, told the FBI she was immediately struck by Epstein’s lifestyle and the company he kept, describing it as “pretty incredible to see all the people Epstein dealt with in politics, television, et cetera.”
“Groff felt, ‘Wow,'” according to an FBI account of her interview.
Groff was initially paid a salary of $60,000 a year, but saw it doubled to $120,000 by Epstein four years later, DOJ records show.
The New York Times reported in 2005 that Epstein bought Groff a new Mercedes and paid for a nanny to ensure she would keep working for him.
“There is no way that I could lose Lesley to motherhood,” Epstein said of Groff, according to the newspaper’s account.
Banking records included in the DOJ’s Epstein files indicate that Groff also received three payments of $100,000 and one for $110,000 from Epstein companies between 2016 and 2018, though the records do not indicate the reasons for the payments.
When Epstein was arrested a second time in 2019, she resigned, her lawyer told prosecutors.
“She felt betrayed and disgusted once the indictment came out,” Bachner wrote.
According to documents released by the Justice Department in response to the passage of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, one victim — who was a minor at the time of her alleged abuse — told the FBI that she felt Groff “knew that the massage appointments were sexual” and “felt it was pretty obvious Lesley knew what was going on,” according to the DOJ records.
Federal prosecutors in 2021 informed Groff that she would not be charged, according to a statement from her attorneys.
“After a more than two-year investigation by the Department of Justice into Jeffrey Epstein’s conduct, which included lengthy interviews of witnesses and a thorough review of relevant communications, we have been informed that no criminal charges will be brought against Lesley Groff,” the statement said.
Lacerda said she hopes the congressional investigators press Groff for answers.
“I just think that she should be honest about it so that we can have some accountability here,” she said.
House Oversight Chairman James Comer said on his way in Tuesday morning that he believed Groff has “information that is very valuable to our investigation.”
“Hopefully, we’ll learn more today,” Comer said.
The chairman reiterated that the committee is conducting “the most thorough investigation ever of Epstein.”
“We’re bringing in the most important people in the whole Epstein criminal enterprise that are still alive, and hopefully we’ll get the truth to the American people. If there’s an opportunity for accountability, we sure want to see that happen,” he said.
Groff did not speak to reporters upon her arrival.
Stock image of car air conditioning ventilation grille. (aire images/Getty Images)
(RIVERVIEW, Fla.) — A 3-year-old boy died after being left in a hot car in Florida, according to authorities.
Deputies responded to a home in Riverview, just outside of Tampa, at about 10:40 p.m. Saturday after the boy’s father found him unresponsive in a parked car, the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office said.
The boy was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead, the sheriff’s office said.
The temperature hit a scorching 95 degrees in Riverview on Saturday, and with humidity, it felt hotter than 100 degrees.
It’s not clear how long the boy was in the car.
Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister called the death a “tragedy” and warned, “A vehicle can reach lethal temperatures within minutes.”
“We urge every parent and caregiver in our community to make hot vehicle safety a priority,” the sheriff said in a statement. “Never leave a child unattended in a vehicle, even for a moment.”
No charges have been filed at this time and the investigation is ongoing, according to the sheriff’s office.
At least eight children have died in hot cars so far this year in the U.S., according to national nonprofit KidsAndCars.org. Last year, at least 37 children died in hot cars across the country, KidsAndCars.org said.
Click here for what to know to keep your children safe.
ABC News’ Kenton Gewecke contributed to this report.
Stock image of police tape. (halbergman/Getty Images)
(CHESTER TOWNSHIP, N.J.) — More than one month after a New Jersey mom was killed in her suburban home, prosecutors say no arrests have been made.
Brooke Hanlon, 35, was found dead in her house in Chester Township after officers responded to a 911 call in the late afternoon of June 6, the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office said.
Her death was ruled a homicide from “multiple sharp force injuries,” prosecutors said.
Hanlon’s sister, Paige Haggerty, told Fox News Digital that “Brooke was the sweetest, purest person that I have ever known in my entire life,” and she called Hanlon’s baby “the only saving grace.”
The 35-year-old worked as a therapist in Bernardsville, New Jersey, according to LifeStance.
“We are deeply saddened at the passing of our teammate Brooke Hanlon,” a LifeStance spokesperson told ABC News in a statement. “Brooke was a beloved member of our Bernardsville team and an exceptional therapist who was highly dedicated to her clients. Our thoughts and deepest sympathies are with Brooke’s family and friends during this difficult time.”
Prosecutors said the case is active and ongoing.
Officials urge anyone with information to call the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office at 973-285-2900, Chester Police at 908-879-5100 or CrimeStoppers at 973-267-2255. A reward up to $1,000 is available, Morris County Sheriff’s CrimeStoppers said.
