A few of you have asked why the Winter Solstice does not have the earliest sunset of the year. A great question since it is the day with the shortest amount of daylight. Most places in the U.S. have their earliest sunset a week or two before the solstice and their latest sunrise sometime in January. This from earthsky.org: The key to understanding the earliest sunset is not to focus on the time of sunset or sunrise. The key is to focus on what is called TRUE SOLAR NOON – the time of day that the sun reaches its highest point, in its journey across your sky. In early December, true solar noon comes nearly 10 minutes earlier by the clock than it does at the solstice around December 21. With true noon coming later on the solstice, so will the sunrise and sunset times. It’s this discrepancy between clock time and sun time that causes the earliest sunset and the earliest sunrise to precede the December solstice. You can figure out the solar noon with the calculator below.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Dec 2014 17:45:53 +0000
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