What Time Is It At The Poles? - Culture of the whole world

Sign up for Scientific American ’s free newsletters. ” data-newsletterpromo_article-image=”https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/4641809D-B8F1-41A3-9E5A87C21ADB2FD8_source.png” data-newsletterpromo_article-button-text=”Sign Up” data-newsletterpromo_article-button-link=”https://www.scientificamerican.com/page/newsletter-sign-up/?origincode=2018_sciam_ArticlePromo_NewsletterSignUp” name=”articleBody” itemprop=”articleBody”> In October 2019 the icebreaker RV Polarstern sat trapped in thick sea ice atop the central Arctic Ocean—the only landmark in a vast expanse of nothingness. Another icebreaker, the Akademik Fedorov, approached it slowly, hauling a load of supplies and personnel. Scientists and crew lined the balconies of each ship, gripping the ice-crusted banisters as they peered across the void. They could see the smiling faces of their colleagues just feet away—but they were two time zones apart. At the North Pole, 24 time zones collide at a single point, rendering them meaningless. It’s simultaneously all of Earth’s time zones and none of them. There are no boundaries of any kind in this abyss, in part because there is no land and no people. The sun rises and sets just once per year, so “time of day” is irrelevant as well. Yet there rests the Polarstern, deliberately locked in ice for a year to measure all aspects of that ice, the ocean beneath it and the sky above. The ship is filled with 100 people from 20 countries, drifting at the mercy of the ice floe, farther from civilization than the International Space Station. I’ve been supporting communications for the mission remotely from landlocked Colorado, where time is stable. My world is a bewildering contrast to the alien one the ship’s scientists are living and working in—where time functions and feels different than anywhere else on the planet. No Time Zones Since the expedition began last September, the Polarstern ‘s time zone has shifted more than a dozen times. When the Akademik Fedorov and Polarstern parked side by side, they were still hours apart. But with no other people within hundreds of miles in all directions and with no cues from the permanently dark sky, the very concept of a time “zone” seemed meaningless. At Earth’s other pole, time zones are quirky but rooted in utility. In Antarctica there is land and dozens of research stations scattered across thousands of square miles. At most stations, permanent buildings house laboratories, living quarters and social spaces. Each mini civilization has adopted its own time zone that corresponds with the home territory that built each place. At the North Pole, it’s all ocean, visited only rarely by an occasional research vessel or a lonely supply ship that strayed from the Northwest Passage. Sea captains choose their own time in the central Arctic. They may maintain the time zones of bordering countries—or they may switch based on ship activities. Sitting here in my grounded office, it is baffling to think about a place where a single human can decide to create an entire time zone at any instant. Last fall the Polarstern captain pushed the time zone back one hour every week, for six weeks, to sync up with incoming Russian ships that follow Moscow time. With each shift, the captain adjusted automatic clocks scattered around the ship. Researchers paused to watch the hands of analog clocks spin eerily backward. And every time the time changed, it jostled the delicate balance of clock-based communication—between instruments deployed on the ice, between researchers onboard, and between them and their families and colleagues on faraway land. No Time If drifting without established time zones isn’t alienating enough for people onboard, add the unsettling reality that there is no time of day either. What we think of as a single day, flanked by sunrise and sunset, happens just once per year around the North Pole. So I can’t help but wonder: Does a single day up North last for months? Is a year just a day long? The Polarstern was engulfed by darkness in October after a three-week-long sunset—just as the other pole saw the first bits of a three-week sunrise after months of black. Once polar night takes over, there is only relentless darkness. Looking out from the ship’s deck, a person sees a horizonless cavity—unless it is dotted by needles of light spouting from the headlamps of a couple of distant human beings at work—an otherworldly scene not unlike being on the moon. Inside the ship is just as bizarre. How can 100 people function if there is no day, no night, no morning, no evening? The voice of the German ship captain blasting over an intercom system is the sound of a wake-up call at 8 A.M.—whenever “8 A.M.” happens to be. People file into the mess hall for meals, held at predetermined intervals. Scientists head out to the ice to check on equipment or meet in laboratories at equally rigid periods. The ship operates like a windup toy, disconnected from the spinning of the planet, which normally dictates time. “Time” is just an operational ritual, intended to create the illusion of regularity. When scientists’ fingers are warm enough, they may occasionally send a limited satellite text to their bustling worlds far away. Communication with friends and colleagues who are in dozens of time zones involves convoluted time conversions—a reminder that the people on the ship are in suspended animation. A fleeting text message is only a momentary connection to a distant existence. Weeks and months blur together. There’s no television, no news, no people passing by. Holidays come and go without festive displays in supermarkets or incessant holiday songs on car radios. The very concept of “December” feels fabricated. Each repetition of the operational rituals between subsequent periods of sleep feels identical, like living the same “day” again and again. The only thing that truly reminds the team that time still ticks forward is data collection. Research instruments dot the frozen landscape around the ship, collecting measurements of the ice, the ocean, the sky—all on Coordinated Universal Time, which is based, ironically, on the position of the sun relative to Earth. The science, however, progresses undisturbed. Data collection has followed its own time since the Polarstern shoved off last September, liberated from the mental whiplash the humans endure. For the people onboard, monitoring the ever progressing data gives them a sense of the forward arrow of time. Otherwise, that sense can only come with facial hair that grows—and with the smell of fresh bread: when the odor wafts through the ship, it must be “Sunday.” When scientists leave the Polarstern, they experience true timelessness. Some instruments are set up miles away on the ice, reachable only by helicopter. It’s so dark during the flights that researchers looking out the window can’t tell how far away the ground—or rather the ice floating on the ocean—is. The helicopter drops them on the surface and takes off again, the sound of whirring blades fading into the distance. Then it’s true silence. All sense of time is irrelevant. Researchers may be huddled together, their headlamps creating a tiny pool of light in the blackness, like astronauts floating in space. Their head is heavily bundled from the cold, so all they hear is the beating of their own heart. That rhythm becomes the only tangible measure to track the passing of time. A polar bear guard stands watch as the researchers work, trying to scan the horizon for danger. The polar bear, the animal that actually patrols the dark, frozen landscape, has no concept of time either. Maybe the bear feels only the pulse of Earth as it spins. What Matters May Be Experience My first of only a few calls from Colorado to the ship involved weeks of planning and trying and failing to connect with a satellite dish up there that could be blown over or buried under snow at any moment. When I finally made a connection, I held my breath and listened to a faint ring, then a long, cold pause. The muffled, husky voice of a Russian radio attendant answered, “RV Polarstern, this is Igor.” A few weeks later I worked to organize a San Francisco–based press conference for the expedition. Our goal: connect journalists with ship-based researchers by phone in real time. Logistics meant connecting with colleagues in five time zones on land while trying to nail down the “time” of a ship that could drift into another time zone at any instant. It felt like throwing darts blindfolded at a moving target. We pulled it off, and soon after I was on a plane home. When the wheels hit the tarmac, I grabbed my phone to text my husband that I had landed safely. When I toggled off airplane mode, I saw the time jump from 8 P.M. to 9 P.M. in an instant. Time is weird everywhere. Maybe time is defined not by numbers or zones or the spinning of Earth—but by what we experience. When I entered my house, I was eagerly greeted by my dogs. I fed them their dinner—their favorite “time” of day. Right about then, researchers on the ship were eating a bowl of warm oats before hitting the ice—”time” to check those instruments again. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

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Contents

- 0.0.1 What time is used at the poles?
0.1 What time is it at the South Poles?
- 0.1.1 What time zone is the Arctic in?

1 Is a day 24 hours at the poles?
2 Is time faster at the poles?
3 Why is it always day in the Arctic?
- 3.1 Does Antarctica have 6 months of darkness?
  - 3.1.1 Which country has 24 hour night?
  - 3.1.2 Do you age slower at the poles?
- 3.2 Is Earth longer at poles?
4 Why do the poles have 24 hours daylight?
5 Is it day or night in the South Pole?
6 Is it day or night at the South Pole right now?
- - 6.0.1 How long is night at the poles?

What time is used at the poles?

What time is it at the North Pole? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk

What time is it at the North Pole?
Harold Somers, Manchester

We have had this one before. The concept of time of day becomes meaningless at the North Pole, but there is a long-established convention that GMT is used. Pelham Barton, Birmingham U.K.

Greenwich mean time. The same is true at the South pole, and the entire surface of the moon.
2. Bernard O’Leary, Dublin Ireland

The time of day at the poles has no practical significance; it is either Summer or Winter (or somewhere in between). Of course, the moment you take a step you are technically in a time zone. The closer you are to the equator, the greater the contrast between night and day and therefore the greater significance of the time of day.
- Chris Wright, Twickenham UK

As all the lines of longtitude meet at the North Pole, theoretically, it could be any time throughout twenty four hours. However, it generally taken to be whatever time it is Greenwich Mean Time. Ray Mitcham, Southport U.K.

By convention the time at the North (and South) Pole is Zulu time, also known as GMT. This applies to a large region around both poles.
2. Simon Blake, Shrewsbury England

Both poles run on GMT, as does space, and before you ask no there isn’t such a thing as space daylight savings time!
- Iain Lambert, Slough UK

: What time is it at the North Pole? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk

What time is it at the South Poles?

Time Zones Currently Being Used in Antarctica –


Offset	Time Zone Abbreviation & Name	Example City	Current Time
UTC -3	ART	Argentina Time	Carlini Base	Wed, 13:47:12
CLST	Chile Summer Time	Palmer Station	Wed, 13:47:12
UTC +2	CEST	Central European Summer Time	Troll Station	Wed, 18:47:12
UTC +5	MAWT	Mawson Time	Mawson	Wed, 21:47:12
UTC +6	VOST	Vostok Time	Vostok Station	Wed, 22:47:12
UTC +7	DAVT	Davis Time	Davis	Wed, 23:47:12
UTC +8	CAST	Casey Time	Casey	Thu, 00:47:12
UTC +10	DDUT	Dumont-d’Urville Time	Dumont d’Urville Station	Thu, 02:47:12
UTC +12	NZST	New Zealand Standard Time	Mario Zucchelli Station	Thu, 04:47:12

What time zone is the Arctic in?

The time zone in the Arctic is GMT +1.0 hour. on Svalbard trips is CET. East Greenland trips switch time zones mid-trip to fit Iceland time (GMT), West Greenland trips stays at GMT -2.

Is a day 24 hours at the poles?

Daylight, Darkness and Changing of the Seasons at the North Pole Illustrated with images from the North Pole Web Cam Winter The darkest time of year at the North Pole is the Winter Solstice, approximately December 21. There has been no sunlight or even twilight since early October.

In summertime, the sun is always above the horizon at the North Pole, circling the Pole once every day. It is highest in the sky at the Summer Solstice, after which it moves closer to the horizon, until it sinks below the horizon, at the Fall Equinox.

The North Pole stays in full sunlight all day long throughout the entire summer (unless there are clouds), and this is the reason that the Arctic is called the land of the ” Midnight Sun “*. After the Summer Solstice, the sun starts to sink towards the horizon.

Is time faster at the poles?

Priyamvada Natarajan replies : – Jeremy Bernstein is right to note that Einstein himself, using his theory of special relativity, got the prediction of clock speeds wrong in 1905. He incorrectly predicted that due to the earth’s rotation, a clock at the equator would run slower than one at the poles.

Einstein did not anticipate his own theory of general relativity, which he would need to get it right—this would come in 1915. In a 2005 article in Physics Today titled “A Small Puzzle from 1905,” the physicists Alex Harvey and Engelbert Schucking pointed out that Einstein made this error by failing to take into account an effect of general relativity positing that clocks more deeply embedded in a gravitational field would run slower.

Clocks run slightly faster at the equator compared to the poles because the earth’s rotation produces a slight bulge at the equator. However, the earth is also rotating faster at the equator. These two effects compensate for each other exactly, causing clocks to actually run at the same rate in both locations.

Harvey and Schucking give another explanation for why the rates of polar and equatorial clocks must be the same. They write that in the moving earth frame, both clocks are at rest, and since both clocks are at the same effective gravitational potential, they tick at the same rate. But as I mention in “What Scientists Really Do,” these two effects do not compensate exactly for a clock on earth and one aboard a GPS satellite.

While Einstein did not anticipate his theory of general relativity, a recently discovered unpublished manuscript among his papers at Hebrew University, written in 1931, shows he was curiously prescient in another instance. Despite his initial resistance to Edwin Hubble’s discovery of the expanding universe, and even after his public embrace of it, Einstein struggled privately with the idea.

Does North Pole have a time zone?

Time – In most places on Earth, local time is determined by longitude, such that the time of day is more or less synchronised to the position of the sun in the sky (for example, at midday, the sun is roughly at its highest). This line of reasoning fails at the North Pole, where the sun rises and sets only once per year, and all lines of longitude, and hence all time zones, converge.

What is troll time?

Time zone: Troll Time (UTC/CEST) UTC +2. now 6 hours ahead of New York. From 29 October 2023: UTC +0 / Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)

How long is night at the poles?

Within the ring of the Arctic Circle is a phenomenon that defies all sense of time – months go by where the sun never rises and the night reigns supreme for week after week. This is the polar night. What is the polar night? The polar night is the term for when night lasts for more than 24 hours inside the polar circles.

In this case, ‘night’ is defined as when the centre of the Sun is below the horizon.
Not all latitudes are situated north enough to experience sustained total darkness; instead their brightest moments are levels of polar twilight that occur in the early afternoon before evening approaches and the darkness intensifies.

What causes the polar night? The polar night is caused by the rotation of the earth in relation to the position of the sun. The earth rotates on a titled axis of around 23.5 degrees. As a result of this axial tilt, there are periods of the year where the Arctic Circle and the Antarctic Circle are either completely exposed or obscured from the sun.

When they are obscured it causes the prolonged darkness known as the polar night, while when they are exposed it creates a prolonged period of daylight known as the midnight sun. You can see the axial tilt of the Earth visualised in the image below, as one pole is totally exposed to the sun while the other is completely obscured: How long does the polar night last? The full length of the polar night depends on your latitude.

The average duration for most destinations is around 30 days, but more northerly locations can enjoy as almost two months of darkness. If you were situated at one of the poles this would last for around 11 weeks. Where can I experience the polar night? In Sweden’s most northern city of Kiruna, the polar night lasts for approximately 28 twenty-four-hour periods.

In the Norwegian city of Tromsø, the dark hours can last for up to a month a half.
If you visit Hammerfest, both the northernmost city in the world and one of the two oldest towns in Norway, the polar night lasts for almost two months.
Experience the polar night for yourself If you would like to experience the polar night for yourself, we are eager to help.

With are expertise, we can create a tailor made holiday package that combines the polar night with many of our destinations’ other exciting sights and sounds – the most popular being the Northern Lights, Take the first step to your dream vacation and contact us,

Is it day or night in Antarctica now?

Night, Twilight, and Daylight Times in South Pole Today –

Astro. Twilight	00:00 – 23:59

Why is it always day in the Arctic?

Planetary tilt = polar night or midnight sun – In the polar regions, the midnight sun occurs due to the angle of the planet in polar summer. During the polar summer, one particular pole of the planet is pointed towards the sun at an acute angle. This angle prevents the region from falling into shadow as the Earth turns, hence no night time.

Does Antarctica have 6 months of darkness?

Antarctica has just two seasons: summer and winter. Antarctica has six months of daylight in its summer and six months of darkness in its winter. The seasons are caused by the tilt of Earth’s axis in relation to the sun. The direction of the tilt never changes.

Which country has 24 hour night?

Svalbard, Norway (for the Polar Night) – Northern lights in Svalbard, Norway Svalbard is a group of islands between Norway and the North Pole and is pretty much as far north as you can go without joining an arctic science expedition. The area is famous for attracting visitors during the polar night season of mid-November to the end of January when the islands are in constant night.

This is your best chance to see the mystical aurora borealis, aka the Northern Lights.
According to the official tourism board for Svalbard, the only natural light sources during that time are the moon, the stars, and the aurora.
Taking a stroll out to see the night sky can be awe-inspiring.
The constant darkness throughout the day not only increases the chances of seeing aurora borealis, but also allows for a unique Northern Lights experience with different colors and strengths during the non-nighttime periods.

It’s something most of the other Northern Lights destinations don’t have!

Do you age slower at the poles?

How does gravity affect the passage of time? (Image credit: Yuichiro Chino via Getty Images) Einstein’s theory of general relativity upended humanity’s understanding of the universe more than a century ago, and since then, scientists have discovered that the steady march of time is anything but steady.

Among the haunting implications of general relativity is that time passes more quickly at the top of every staircase in the world than it does at the bottom.
This mind-bending phenomenon happens because the closer an object is to Earth, the stronger the impacts of gravity are.
And because general relativity describes gravity as the warping of space and time, time itself travels more slowly at higher altitudes and greater distances from Earth, where gravity has less of an effect.

So, if time is linked to gravity, does that mean that people on top of mountains age faster than people at sea level do? Does increased gravity actually make people age more slowly? Indeed, for all objects farther away from a gravitational field, such as Earth, time actually moves more slowly, James Chin-wen Chou (opens in new tab), a physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder, Colorado, told Live Science in an email.

That means people who live at high altitudes age a tad faster than those plodding through space-time at sea level. “Gravity makes us age slower, in a relative term,” Chou said. “Compared to someone not near any massive object, we are aging more slowly by a very tiny amount. In fact, for that someone, the whole world around us evolves more slowly under the effect of gravity.” Related: What is the shape of the universe? The differences are minor but measurable.

If you were to sit at the peak of Mount Everest — which is 29,000 feet (8,848 meters) above sea level — for 30 years, you would be 0.91 millisecond older than if you had spent those same 30 years at sea level, according to NIST (opens in new tab), Similarly, if twins living at sea level were to part ways for 30 years, with one relocating to mile-high (1,600 m) Boulder, Colorado, and the other staying put, the high-elevation twin would be 0.17 millisecond older than their twin when they reunited.

In a striking experiment, NIST researchers used one of the most precise atomic clocks in the world to demonstrate that time runs faster even a mere 0.008 inch (0.2 millimeter) above the Earth’s surface.
These aren’t just calculations,” said Tobias Bothwell (opens in new tab), a physicist at NIST and co-author of a 2022 paper published in the journal Nature (opens in new tab) describing the experiment.

“We have seen the change in the ticking of a clock at a distance roughly the width of a human hair,” he told Live Science. The key to understanding why massive objects warp the passage of time is recognizing that ” space-time ” is a four-dimensional tapestry woven from three space coordinates (up/down, right/left and forward/back) and one time coordinate (past/future).

Gravity, in a relativistic model, is what we call it when any object with mass distorts that tapestry, curving space and time as one. “Anything that possesses mass affects space-time,” Andrew Norton (opens in new tab), a professor of astrophysics at The Open University in the U.K., told Live Science in an email.

In the vicinity of an object with mass, “space-time is distorted, resulting in the bending of space and the dilation of time. “The effect is real and measurable but negligible in everyday situations,” Norton said. When it comes to non-everyday situations, however, this phenomenon — also known as gravitational time dilation — can get messy.

According to Norton, GPS satellites circling the globe at an altitude of 12,544 miles (20,186 kilometers) need to adjust for the fact that their clocks run 45.7 microseconds faster than clocks down here, over the course of 24 hours.
The most pressing effect of relativity over the passage of time is probably the accuracy of GPS,” Chou said.

“Because they are moving at high speeds and high up away from the earth, the relativistic effects from speed and gravity need to be carefully accounted for so that we are able to infer our position on the globe with high accuracy.” Closer to home, it is clear that gravity does, in fact, make us age more slowly.

Sure, it’s usually only a matter of milliseconds, and cowering at sea level is hardly a viable anti-aging strategy.
But time is both precious and fleeting, especially when distant from any objects with mass.
Stay up to date on the latest science news by signing up for our Essentials newsletter. Joshua A.

Krisch is a freelance science writer. He is particularly interested in biology and biomedical sciences, but he has covered technology, environmental issues, space, mathematics, and health policy, and he is interested in anything that could plausibly be defined as science.

Is Earth longer at poles?

Earth is slightly smaller when measured between the North and South Poles which gives a diameter of 7,907 miles (12,725 kilometers). Earth bulges out a bit more around the equator than around the poles because of its rotation (spin).

Why do the poles have 24 hours daylight?

One Sunrise and Sunset a Year at the Poles – The North Pole and South Pole move in and out of sunlight as the Earth orbits the Sun. ©timeanddate.com At the June solstice, the North Pole is pointed toward the Sun. No matter how much the Earth rotates, the Sun never appears to set, producing the phenomenon of the Midnight Sun.

The South Pole, on the other hand, is in 24-hour darkness: polar night. Six months later at the December solstice —when the Earth is on the other side of the Sun—the situation is reversed. Now the North Pole is pointed away from the Sun, and the Sun does not rise at all. Meanwhile, the South Pole is bathed in the continuous sunlight of polar day.

The March equinox, when neither pole is pointed more toward the Sun, is the time of sunrise at the North Pole, and sunset at the South Pole. Likewise, the September equinox brings sunset to the North Pole, and sunrise to the South Pole. In other words, sunrise and sunset at the poles are caused not by the Earth’s rotation, but by its orbit around the Sun.

Is it day or night in the South Pole?

During summer, Antarctica is on the side of Earth tilted toward the sun and is in constant sunlight. In the winter, Antarctica is on the side of Earth tilted away from the sun, causing the continent to be dark.

Is it day or night at the South Pole right now?

Night, Twilight, and Daylight Times in South Pole Today –

Astro. Twilight	00:00 – 23:59

How long is night at the poles?

In this case, ‘night’ is defined as when the centre of the Sun is below the horizon. Not all latitudes are situated north enough to experience sustained total darkness; instead their brightest moments are levels of polar twilight that occur in the early afternoon before evening approaches and the darkness intensifies.

When they are obscured it causes the prolonged darkness known as the polar night, while when they are exposed it creates a prolonged period of daylight known as the midnight sun.
You can see the axial tilt of the Earth visualised in the image below, as one pole is totally exposed to the sun while the other is completely obscured: How long does the polar night last? The full length of the polar night depends on your latitude.

In the Norwegian city of Tromsø, the dark hours can last for up to a month a half. If you visit Hammerfest, both the northernmost city in the world and one of the two oldest towns in Norway, the polar night lasts for almost two months. Experience the polar night for yourself If you would like to experience the polar night for yourself, we are eager to help.