Since 1992
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By Barbara McAllister
Word of the Day: Solstice
The summer solstice this year occurred on Sunday, June 20, ushering in the official start of summer in the northern hemisphere. The term “solstice” is derived from the Latin words “sol,” for sun, and “sistere,” to stand still. That’s because the sun’s relative position in the sky at noon does not appear to change much during the solstice and the surrounding days. The sun is directly overhead at the Tropic of Cancer, which was named by the ancient civilization that noticed the sun appeared in the constellation of Cancer during this time. If you happen to be in the Tropic of Cancer during the solstice, the sun will be directly overhead at a 90-degree angle to the Earth at noon. It will be one of the few times the sun will not cast a shadow.
It’s counter-intuitive, but the Earth in the Northern Hemisphere is at its farthest from the sun during this time. Our planet is closer to the sun in winter. The heat of summer comes exclusively from the tilt of the Earth’s axis, and not from how close it is to the sun at any given time. All the planets in our solar system have summer solstices. When the north pole of any planet is tilted toward the sun, astronomers call it the summer solstice. Mars’ solstice occurs in June, a few days after Earth’s. Uranus is farther from the sun and has a strange sideways rotation so each year on Uranus, or the time it takes to go around the sun, lasts 84 earth years. That means the summer solstice ushers in 21 years of summer daytime. Of course, that also means there’s 21 years of winter nighttime. Suddenly, Maine winters don’t seem so long.
