Man visually impaired during eclipse warns of viewing dangers

It's nearly time for the Northern Hemisphere to watch the skies go dark and see the solar eclipse unfold on August 21.

Tomososki, 70, was a high school kid in 1962 when he and a friend looked up to glance at a partial solar eclipse - "We were just doing it for a short time, he says" - and saw a flash of light similar to that of a camera flash. And 55 years later, "Nothing has changed", he told TODAY.

While Tomososki's teachers warned him to use a pinhole projector box, which creates a reflection of the eclipse for safe viewing, he didn't heed the warning.

Nobody was talking about safety glasses back then, so he watched it with the naked eye, closing his left eye and leaving his right eye open.

A reason why he urges those planning to watch Monday's solar eclipse to be careful.

"Millions of people out there are going to be looking out at it..." "That makes me sick". Reinoso says a good way to check if your glasses are ISO 12312-2, you should be able to see absolutely no light when you put them on.

The sun ended up burning his right eye, causing permanent damage. It's a pinpoint of blindness, often in the middle of the eye.

"It'll cause loss of vision, it can cause blind spots in your vision, and it can cause your vision to be warped as well", he said.

"When you partially obscure the sun with the moon, it's not so bright, and it's not so painful to actually look at it", Dr. G. Baker Hubbard of the Emory Eye Center in Atlanta told FOX5. "The second the sun comes out, the eclipse glasses have to go back on".

"Some damage occurs pretty quickly, but a lot of damage can take hours to days to really come to bear", Lujan said.

"A quick look like we did back in 1963, and I'm 71, nearly 71 now, that quick look cost us", Tomososki said.