Patrick Mahomes Eclipse Video Goes Viral

Footage of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes watching Monday's solar eclipse with his family has gone viral on social media.

Millions gathered across the U.S. to watch the spectacle, flooding the 13 states in the eclipse's path of totality—where the moon completely blocked out the sun. With the route beginning in Mexico and ending in Texas, some areas were blacked out for up to four minutes.

Emergency warnings were broadcast in some locations due to the expected influx of visitors, along with messages on how to safely view the eclipse.

Safety was of concern for NFL star Mahomes, when he watched the phenomenon with his wife, Brittany Mahomes, and their two children, daughter Sterling Skye, 3, and son Patrick, nicknamed "Bronze," born in November 2022.

Brittany Mahomes shared Instagram Story posts of the experience, showing the family gathered outside. One video clip showed Patrick Mahomes holding his daughter as his wife asked: "Sterling, what do you see?"

"I see a moon," the toddler responded as she held in place her protective eyewear—a vital accessory for looking directly at the eclipse.

Also protecting his eyes, Patrick Mahomes looked up at the sky as he exclaimed: "Dang!"

However, a later video showed the athlete averting potential disaster when Sterling was seen wandering around on the porch before attempting to look up at the sky without her protective eyewear.

The doting dad ran with his arms up to block his daughter's view, as Brittany Mahomes said with a laugh: "Don't look, Sterling!"

Heeding her mother's advice, the youngster quickly turned her head as the brief clip came to an end.

A snippet of the moment was copied and shared on X, formerly Twitter, where, as of press time, it has garnered more than 180,000 views.

"[I don't know] why, but is so funny to me," the uploader captioned the clip. "Pat running to block Sterling from looking at the sun without her glasses[...] his hands."

Patrick Mahomes' mother, Randi Martin, responded to the post, writing of her son: "He really is the best daddy!!"

Ahead of the eclipse, officials advised that looking directly at the sun during the event risked causing severe and permanent damage to the eyes.

Ultraviolet radiation can cause sunburn of the cornea, known as solar keratitis, possibly leading to solar retinopathy when a hole is burned into the retina (the light-sensitive layer at the back of the eye).

It is crucial to use proper eye protection such as solar viewing glasses or indirect viewing methods like pinhole projectors. These methods allow you to safely observe the eclipse without risking eye damage.

These glasses have special filters that block out harmful ultraviolet, visible, and infrared radiation.

"Eclipse glasses are NOT regular sunglasses; regular sunglasses, no matter how dark, are not safe for viewing the sun. Safe solar viewers are thousands of times darker and ought to comply with the ISO 12312-2 international standard," NASA advised in a post about eclipse safety ahead of Monday's event.

The next eclipse visible from the U.S. will be 20 years from now, in August 2044.