The Suns Daily Motion Multiple-exposure photo of the setting sun, showing that it follows the same diagonal path that a star would, as seen from a mid-northern latitude. This photo was made on June 21, when the sun set considerably north of due west. On any given day, the sun moves through our sky in the same way as a star. It rises somewhere along the eastern horizon and sets somewhere in the west. If you live at a mid-northern latitude (most of North America, Europe, Asia, and northern Africa), you always see the noon sun somewhere in the southern sky. But as the weeks and months pass, youll notice that the suns motion isnt quite the same as that of any star. For one thing, the sun takes a full 24 hours to make a complete circle around the celestial sphere, instead of just 23 hours, 56 minutes. For obvious reasons, we define our day based on the motion of the sun, not the stars. Moreover, the location of the suns path across the sky varies with the seasons, as shown in the computer-generated image below, which shows the eastern sky, viewed from a mid-northern latitude.
Posted on: Sun, 30 Mar 2014 14:46:03 +0000