Filipinos to experience longest night on December 22

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines will experience winter solstice on Thursday (December 22) when the night is longest, the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) said.

 

The sun will be at its farthest point south of the equator at 6:44 p.m. on that day, Ed Lagoc, observer at PAGASA's Astronomical Observatory said Sunday.

 

The winter solstice marks the time when the sun lies at its farthest point south of the equator.

 

"Philippine nights will be longer than daytime. Earth has now completed another annual circuit around the Sun," PAGASA said in a Facebook post.

 

 

Dario dela Cruz, astronomy chief of PAGASA, said the night will be longest in areas that are farther from the equator.

 

"In the Philippines' case, that means the duration of the longest night will be most lengthy in extreme northern Luzon and shortest in Mindanao," Dela Cruz noted.

 

The solstice is the astronomical event during which the sun is at its greatest northerly or southerly distance from the equator, the imaginary line dividing Earth into the northern and southern hemispheres.

 

The annual December astronomical event is the northern hemisphere's winter solstice when night is longest and day is shortest. The opposite happens at the southern hemisphere, where summer solstice is experienced around that time, when night there is shortest and day is longest.

 

In contrast, the annual June astronomical event known as the northern hemisphere's summer solstice is when night is shortest and day is longest. It is also the southern hemisphere's winter solstice when night there is longest and day is shortest.

 

PAGASA said that night will be 13 hours and five minutes long in Basco, Batanes and 12 hours and 46 minutes long in Metro Manila.

 

Night in Cebu City will last for 12 hours and 28 minutes while it will last for 12 hours and 14 minutes in General Santos City.

 

The state weather bureau said that the solstice in December signals the onset of winter in the northern hemisphere and start of summer in the southern hemisphere. Meanwhile, the solstice in June signals the onset of summer in the northern hemisphere and winter in the southern hemisphere. — with a report from PNA