Businesses prepare for eclipse-related complications, disruptions

Many thousands of people are expected to attend Indiana gatherings and festivities in honor of the April 8 solar eclipse, a rare celestial event that will bring a few minutes of midday darkness to much of the state.

For the rest of us, it will be just another Monday on the job—and the extra traffic and other crowd-related disruptions will need to be addressed.

“We’re assuming it’s going to be total gridlock downtown,” said T.J. Edwards, emergency preparedness coordinator at Eskenazi Health. “We’re just trying to stay open and be flexible.”

Eskenazi is among the local workplaces whose eclipse preparedness plans might include everything from shifting delivery and staffing schedules to paring back operations to working remotely—or even taking the day off.

Franklin, population 27,000, could be one of the state’s hottest eclipse-watching spots.

The city sits in the center of the eclipse’s path of totality, the 100-mile-wide swath of land that will experience total darkness as the moon passes in front of the sun. Franklin will see one of the longest periods of darkness in the state, at four minutes, 1.7 seconds, starting shortly after 3 p.m. Franklin is also hosting a three-day downtown eclipse festival April 6-8, and city officials say they expect anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 eclipse visitors.

In comparison, downtown Indianapolis will see three minutes, 49.3 seconds of total darkness, and Lebanon will be totally dark for two minutes and 38.3 seconds.

“We’re hoping for the best; we’re trying to plan for the worst,” said Lance Clark, vice president of administration at KYB Americas Corp., an automotive supplier with offices in Greenwood and a manufacturing plant in Franklin.

Clark said the KYB plant, which makes shock absorbers for auto plants across the country, doesn’t have the option of shutting down for the eclipse.

“Most of our customers are around the U.S. [outside of areas that will experience a total eclipse]. So they don’t care that we’re getting an eclipse,” he said. “They just want their parts on time.”

KYB is taking several steps to keep the assembly lines running at its Franklin facility while also giving employees a chance to witness the natural spectacle.

To the degree possible, Clark said, the plant is building up its inventory in advance. It’s also telling customers to consider rescheduling their merchandise pickup times so trucks don’t get stuck in eclipse-day traffic.

KYB is on U.S. 31, which Clark predicted will become congested as crowds depart Franklin once the eclipse is over.

The manufacturer has about 450 day-shift employees and 800 total employees between its Greenwood and Franklin sites. Clark said KYB has purchased several hundred pairs of eclipse safety glasses and will rearrange break schedules and add an extra break that day so employees have a chance to step outside and check out the eclipse.

“We’re trying to recognize that this is a really special event for a lot of people,” he said.

KYB might have higher-than-normal absenteeism that day, he added, because some employees might need to stay home with their children. Many school districts plan to cancel school or conduct remote learning that day.

One saving grace is that KYB is running overtime right now, so most day-shift workers are ending their day at 5:30 p.m. rather than the usual 3:30 p.m.

Andrew Berger, senior vice president of governmental affairs at the Indiana Manufacturers Association, said most manufacturers he’s spoken with are planning for April 8 to be as normal a workday as possible, though some plan to give employees the leeway to briefly view the eclipse.

There are reasons manufacturers don’t like to pause production if they don’t have to.

For one thing, Berger said, manufacturing is a sequential process, so an interruption at any point can create a ripple effect. And if the production process involves components like molten metal or certain chemicals, the timing of certain production steps can be even more critical.

“One step in the process directly impacts the ones before and the ones after,” he said.

Scheduling shifts

Eskenazi Health is taking a different approach. Its hospital trauma and emergency departments downtown will operate as usual, and inpatient surgeries will still take place. But other areas of the hospital campus will be closed on April 8,and so will all of Eskenazi’s outpatient facilities and clinics around the city. Patients who have appointments on April 8are being rescheduled.

Most Eskenazi patients rely on public transportation, Edwards said, and the hospital decided to cancel eclipse-day appointments citywide rather than make patients deal with heavy traffic. “We knew that we were putting them possibly in hours of traffic, should they get to the hospital or get to one of the clinics, have an appointment and then maybe not be able to get back home for hours.”

Although the total-darkness phase of the eclipse lasts only a few minutes, the full eclipse—including its partial phases—lasts more than 2-1/2 hours. In central Indiana, the moon will start at about 1:45 p.m. to slowly obscure the sun. The total eclipse phase will last from about 3:06 p.m. to 3:10 p.m., and the eclipse will end around 4:30 p.m.

For its staff, Eskenazi is adjusting the timing of some of its shifts to minimize the number of workers trying to get to or from work during the height of the eclipse. It also has a limited amount of space for employees who want to stay overnight to avoid lengthy commutes, and it’s encouraging employees who live far away to consider staying overnight with friends who live closer.

The hospital is also planning ahead on food, medical supplies and other essentials, Edwards said. “All of our deliveries, if they don’t come super, super early Monday morning, we’ve doubled our deliveries on the days prior to the eclipse so that we make sure that we have enough of everything that we need.”

Office adjustments

Some local employers that primarily employ office workers are also adjusting operations.

Indianapolis-based Engineered Innovation Group, a tech firm that helps its clients build and launch software products and companies, has told its employees to cancel all appointments and meetings on April 8 and, if they wish, to take a vacation day.

“Those who wish to see the eclipse can use their paid time off and not have the pressure of missing a slate of client or internal meetings,” Vice President of Operations Craig Bowen told employees in a staff memo that the company shared with IBJ.

Engineered Innovation Group has about 30 employees, some of whom live in the Indianapolis area and others who live elsewhere and work remotely. Some of those employees live in other places over which the eclipse will travel, including Mexico, Texas and Maine.

The Central Indiana Corporate Partnership is encouraging its staff to work from home on April 8 so they can avoid the anticipated traffic and crowds, said CEO Melina Kennedy.

CICP has about 100 employees through its five industry-specific initiatives, all of which are housed on the campus of the 16 Tech innovation district in the northwestern corner of downtown.

Kennedy said CICP has also communicated basic eclipse information to employees and purchased eclipse glasses.

“We want to make sure our employees are knowledgeable and safe,” she said.

The organization also plans to host a program for CICP members to discuss potential business impacts of the eclipse.•