We use this beautiful photo today in honor of the June solstice, which happens on June 20 at 23:09 (11:09 p.m.) Universal time (6:09 p.m. Central Daylight Time). This photo is from one of our favorite sky photographers, Dan Bush. It’s from his gallery of sunrises and sunsets.
Everything you need to know: June solstice 2012
No world body has designated an official day to start each new season, and yet today is widely recognized as the beginning of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and beginning of winter on the southern half of Earth’s globe. The fact is that Earth’s orbit around the sun – and tilt on its axis – have brought us to a place in space where our world’s Northern Hemisphere has its time of greatest daylight. The Northern Hemisphere has its longest day. Meanwhile, today marks the shortest day south of the equator.
Earth as seen from the sun at the instant of the June 20 solstice (23:09 Universal Time or 6:09 p.m. Central Daylight Time)
World map courtesy of Earth and Moon Viewer. The sun is at zenith (straight overhead) the North Pacific Ocean at the instant of the June 20 solstice. See how it’s afternoon in the mainland U.S. when this solstice takes place?
By the way, throughout the world, the solstice represents a “turning” of the year. To many cultures, the solstice can mean a limit or a culmination of something. From around the world, the sun is now rising and setting as far north as it ever does. Today’s solstice marks the northernmost sun. Several days from now, the sun will have begun a subtle shift southward on the sky’s dome again.
At mid-northern latitudes, latest sunsets of the year in late June
Celebrate the summer solstice as the Chinese philosophers did
