NAI Global President and CEO Jay Olshonsky and a group of his colleagues were in for a few surprises when they joined millions of people across the country on Monday, taking to the street to check out what they could see of the rare total solar eclipse.
Olshonsky and his team, including Lindsay Fierro, senior vice president of operations, donned eclipse sunglasses and watched the event from New York City's famed Fifth Avenue, known for its big shopping crowds. But the eclipse proved more historic than any big sale with a large crowd, he said.
"I've never seen that many people in the street ever, even at holiday time," Olshonsky said in an interview. His group gathered with the throngs at Fifth and 56th St., looking toward Central Park.
The NAI Global headquarters team hung around until about 3:30 p.m. It was expected that sun-gazers in Midtown would be able to see 90% of the sun covered by the moon at 3:25 p.m.
The size of the crowd wasn't the only surprise among group members. Olshonsky said one of his colleagues told him, "It didn't get as cold as we thought, and it didn't get as dark as we thought."