The Solar Eclipse Is the Super Bowl for Conspiracists

If that wasn’t enough, NASA is launching three satellites as part of its Atmospheric Perturbations around Eclipse Path (APEP) mission. Unfortunately for NASA, Apep is also the name of an ancient Egyptian snake god associated with darkness and destruction—a coincidence that conspiracists have decided is relevant. A celestial body known as the devil’s comet will also be visible to the naked eye during the eclipse.

Finally, many have linked the eclipse with the imminent sacrifice of red heifers in Israel, a practice that some Jews and evangelicals believe will variously herald the construction of a Third Temple in Jerusalem, the return of the messiah, or the end of the world.

“Red Heifers from Texas have arrived in Israel where they will be sacrificed during the Solar Eclipse,” the operator of a prominent conspiracy channel on Telegram wrote this week in a post viewed more than 120,000 times. “At the same time, CERN will be opening up demonic portals.”

Videos citing all of these coincidences have been posted by conspiracists—as well as many Christian evangelical pastors and churches—and have amassed millions of views on YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok in recent weeks.

“There are many indications that the total eclipse in America on Monday is the start of something big,” a renowned UK-based QAnon promoter told his Substack subscribers in an email on Thursday. “Whether the day itself is obviously epic—Nibiru? ETs? DNA activation?” (Nibiru is a conspiracy-laden reference to a predicted cataclysmic encounter between Earth and a large planetary object.)

Sovereign-citizen guru David Straight has also posited a wild conspiracy called Operation Balloon, claiming that the government, using the eclipse blackout as cover, will deploy balloons filled with poisonous gas. Straight didn’t, however, explain why the government wouldn’t just do this at night, when it’s also dark and people are typically not staring at the sky.

One image showing the path of the eclipse passing over more than a dozen significant landmarks has also been shared widely online. Among the landmarks are the birthplaces of former president Bill Clinton and former vice president Mike Pence; the site of the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio; the site of the 1993 massacre in Waco, Texas; and the location of former president John F. Kennedy’s assassination.

As one UK-based dyed-in-the-wool conspiracist wrote on X last weekend, in a post that has been viewed 7.7 million times: “That’s a hell of a lot of coincidences right there.”

There is, of course, absolutely no evidence to back up any of the conspiracies being outlined by these individuals and groups. But if they are unable, or unwilling, to marvel at a celestial phenomenon that has been enjoyed by humans for centuries, that probably warrants at least some introspection.