![]() ![]() More on that farther down in the article. There’s a good explanation (SCIENCE!) for why you don’t get precisely 12 hours of daylight on the equinox. Well, there’s just one rub – it isn’t as perfectly “equal” as you may have thought. For people south of the equator, this equinox actually signals the coming of spring.įolks right along the equator have roughly 12-hour days and 12-hour nights all year long, so they won’t really notice a thing on September 22.īut during the equinox, everyone from pole to pole gets to enjoy a 12/12 split of day and night. If you reside in the Northern Hemisphere, you know it as the fall equinox (or autumnal equinox). On Saturday, we enter our second equinox of 2018. ![]() “The astronomers have us beat as far as the ‘cool’ angle.”Ĭontact Dean Olsen: (217) 836-1068 /DeanOlsenSJR.Twice a year, everyone on Earth is seemingly on equal footing – at least when it comes to the distribution of daytime and nighttime. “I wish it were something cooler,” Albano said. 1, and the seasons change on the first of the month every three months after that, he said. The meteorological classification is based on ease in maintaining climate-related records, according to Mike Albano, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Lincoln.įor meteorologists, fall begins every year on Sept. The equinoxes are based on astronomy, involving the specific positioning of the earth and sun, and so the days they occur each year can vary slightly. Meteorologists classify fall in a different way. The map predicts fall colors will peak in central Illinois from mid- to late October. Because of several variables, it's difficult to predict when fall colors will peak, but the website has an interactive map ( /fall-foliage-map/) to determine peak fall colors across the United States by county. Changes in colors are more dependent on light than temperature. Normally, the moon rises about an hour later (than sunset) each night, but around the time of the fall equinox, the angle of the moon’s orbit and the tilt of the earth line up just right and cause the moon to rise only about 20 to 30 minutes later each night for several nights in a row.” When do the leaves start changing colors?Īccording to Vox.com, the shortening of days causes trees to stop producing chlorophyll, the pigment that makes leaves green and is responsible for photosynthesis. Near the fall equinox, according to the almanac, “the full moon rises around sunset for several nights in a row, which traditionally provided farmers with just enough light for them to finish their harvests before the killing frosts of fall set in. The almanac says the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox always is called the Harvest Moon, and the reason is related to farming. What is the Harvest Moon, and how is it related to the equinox? After the December solstice, days begin to get longer again. What happens after the autumnal equinox?ĭays become shorter than nights as the sun continues to rise later and nightfall arrives earlier. For the other half of the year, the South Pole gets more light. The seasons that we enjoy, according to Vox.com, occur because the tilt of the earth means that for half of the year, the North Pole is pointed toward the sun. When the sun crosses the equator from north to south, this marks the autumnal equinox when it crosses from south to north, this marks the vernal equinox.” The equinox occurs precisely when the sun’s center passes through that line. The earth spins on a tilted axis, and the almanac says the equinox is when the sun crosses the “‘celestial equator’ - an imaginary extension of the earth’s equator line in space. It’s when day and night are roughly equal in length. Here are some interesting details about this time of the year. Central time - is the first day of fall, known as the autumnal equinox or the September equinox or fall equinox, according to The Old Farmer’s Almanac. ![]()
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