Are you wishing the days were longer? If so, your wish will be answered. For people that live in the northern hemisphere, the shortest day of the year — the winter solstice — falls on Saturday, December 21, this year. The days will then begin to lengthen until the summer solstice in June.
This morning, at 3:17am CT, the earth was tilted further away from the sun than at any other time of the year in the northern hemisphere. The sun is also at its lowest arch at midday for the year.
Changing of the seasons
This all occurs because the earth’s angle of rotation is 23.5 degrees off perpendicular as the earth orbits around the sun. So, the directness of sunlight on the earth’s surface changes as the earth orbits the sun, resulting in the changes of the seasons. And, of course, it is the opposite in the southern hemisphere. Today is the first day of summer down there.
Late sunrise, early sunset
On Saturday, the sun rises and sets in Bismarck at 8:25am and 4:57pm, respectively. That’s only 8 hours and 32 minutes between sunrise and sunset.
But by March 20, the spring equinox, when there is roughly 12 hours of day and night, as sunrise and sunset in Bismarck will be at 7:45am and 7:56pm.
Then on June 21, the summer solstice, the longest day of the year, sunrise and sunset in Bismarck will be at 5:48am and 9:41pm. That just short of 16 hours between sunrise and sunset!
Solstice Celebrations
Before early cultures learned about the earth’s rotation and orbit, particularly those who lived in higher latitudes, it is hard to imagine what they thought when, over the course of a few months, the sun shifted further south in the sky and the days continued to shorten. Would they be left in total darkness? Angst and apprehension must have been high. Once the days began to lengthen again, it was time to celebrate.
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Keep an eye in the skies this weekend
You might want to be on the lookout for a few meteors this weekend. You may recall that the Ursids Meteor Shower runs through December 25. The peak viewing period is coming on the night of December 21 and the early hours of December 22, with perhaps 5-10 meteors per hour.
