What’s it? On the June solstice, the sun rises and units farthest north in your horizon, and is closest to being overhead at your local noon.
When is it? A solstice isn’t a complete day. As an alternative, it’s a second, when the sun is farthest north in our sky. In 2023, the solstice second will fall at 14:58 UTC (9:58 a.m. CDT) on Wednesday, June 21.
Notice: On this solstice, the sun can be straight overhead at midday as seen from the Tropic of Cancer. For us within the Northern Hemisphere, the June solstice marks the shortest nights and longest days of the yr. For the Southern Hemisphere, it marks the longest nights and shortest days. After this solstice, the sun will start shifting southward in our sky once more.
What’s a solstice?
Historical cultures knew that the sun’s path throughout the sky, the size of daylight, and the situation of the dawn and sundown all shifted in an everyday manner all year long.
They constructed monuments reminiscent of Stonehenge in England and at Machu Picchu in Peru to observe the sun’s yearly progress.
At this time, we all know that the solstice is attributable to Earth’s tilt on its axis and by its orbital movement across the sun.
The Earth doesn’t orbit upright with respect to the airplane of our orbit across the sun. As an alternative, our world is tilted on its axis by 23 1/2 degrees. Via the yr, this tilt causes Earth’s Northern and Southern Hemispheres to commerce locations in receiving the sun’s gentle and heat most straight.
So it’s Earth’s tilt – not our distance from the sun – that causes winter and summer season. In actual fact, our planet is closest to the sun in January, and farthest from the sun in July, throughout the Northern Hemisphere summer season.
Indicators of the June solstice in nature
The place do you have to look? In all places.
For all of Earth’s creatures, nothing is so basic because the size of the day. In spite of everything, the sun is the last word supply of just about all gentle and heat on Earth’s floor.
In the event you reside within the Northern Hemisphere, you would possibly discover the early dawns and late sunsets, and the excessive arc of the sun throughout the sky every day. You would possibly see how excessive the sun seems within the sky at native midday. And, additionally you’ll want to have a look at your noontime shadow. Across the time of the solstice, it’s your shortest noontime shadow of the yr.
In the event you’re an individual who’s tuned in to the out-of-doors, you recognize the peaceable, comforting feeling that accompanies these indicators and alerts of the yr’s longest day.
Is the June solstice the primary day of summer season?
No world physique has designated an official day to start out every new season, and totally different colleges of thought or traditions outline the seasons in several methods.
In meteorology, for instance, summer season begins on June 1. And each schoolchild is aware of that summer season begins when the final faculty bell of the yr rings.
But June 21 is probably probably the most well known day upon which summer season begins within the Northern Hemisphere and upon which winter begins on the southern half of Earth’s globe. There’s nothing official about it, but it surely’s such a long-held custom that all of us acknowledge it to be so.
It has been common amongst people to treasure this time of light and heat.
For us within the trendy world, the solstice is a time to recall the reverence and understanding that early individuals had for the sky. Some 5,000 years in the past, individuals positioned big stones in a circle on a broad plain in what’s now England and aligned them with the June solstice dawn.
We might by no means comprehend the total significance of Stonehenge. However we do know that information of this kind wasn’t restricted to only one a part of the world. Across the identical time Stonehenge was being constructed in England, two nice pyramids after which the Sphinx have been constructed on Egyptian sands. In the event you stood on the Sphinx on the summer season solstice and gazed towards the 2 pyramids, you’d see the sun set precisely between them.
Why doesn’t the longest day have the most popular climate?
Individuals typically ask:
If the June solstice brings the longest day, why will we expertise the most popular climate in late July and August?
This impact known as the lag of the seasons. It’s the identical purpose it’s hotter in mid-afternoon than at noontime. Earth simply takes some time to heat up after an extended winter. Even in June, ice and snow nonetheless blanket the bottom in some locations. The sun has to soften the ice – and heat the oceans – after which we really feel probably the most sweltering summer season warmth.
Ice and snow have been melting since spring started. Meltwater and rainwater have been percolating down by means of snow on tops of glaciers.
However the runoff from glaciers isn’t as nice now because it’ll be in one other month, regardless that daylight is placing the Northern Hemisphere most straight round now.
So wait another month for the hottest weather. It’ll come when the times are already starting to shorten once more, as Earth continues to maneuver in orbit across the sun, bringing us nearer to a different winter.
And so the cycle continues.
Backside line: The 2023 June solstice will occur on June 21 at 14:58 UTC. That’s 9:58 a.m. CDT on June 21 in North America. This solstice – the start of summer season within the Northern Hemisphere – marks the sun’s most northerly level in Earth’s sky.
Visit EarthSky’s night sky guide.
Why the hottest weather isn’t on the longest day
