2019 Winter Solstice Happens Sunday, Dec. 22, in Northern Hemisphere

Summary: According to Coordinated Universal Time, the 2019 winter solstice happens Sunday, Dec. 22, in the Northern Hemisphere and also opens Southern summer.

view of Dec. 21, 2010, solstice from space; SEVIRI (Spinning Enchanced Visible and Infrared Imager) on EUMETSAT’s (European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites) Meteosat-9 satellite: NASA Earth Observatory via NASA GSFC (Goddard Space Flight Center) Scientific Visualization Studio

The 2019 winter solstice happens Sunday, Dec. 22, in the Northern Hemisphere at 04:19 Coordinated Universal Time (Saturday, Dec. 21, 2019, at 11:19 p.m. Eastern Standard Time) as northern astronomical winter’s announcer and simultaneously opens the Southern Hemisphere’s astronomical summer as a summer solstice.

The December solstice marks astronomical winter throughout Europe, North America and mainland Asia in the Northern Hemisphere. Also, the Northern Hemisphere’s northern two-thirds of Africa, northern part of South America and northern parts of maritime Asia experience the December solstice as astronomical winter’s opener.

In the Southern Hemisphere, the December solstice signals astronomical summer for all of Antarctica and Australia. As Southern Hemisphere occupiers, the lower third of Africa, most of South America and maritime Asia south of the equator also observe a December summer solstice.

The world’s local times zones place the occurrence of the 2019 December solstice either on Saturday, Dec. 21, or on Sunday, Dec. 22. The Saturday, Dec. 21, reflects time zones that lag behind Coordinated Universal Time, by five or more hours. Time zones that are set later than the world’s primary time standard concur in Sunday, Dec. 22, as the date for the 2019 December solstice.

Negative and positive offsets express the world’s local time zones with respect to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). Time zones that are earlier than UTC have negative offsets. Time zones that are later than UTC have positive offsets.

The westernmost time zone’s offset is UTC-12. The negative offset designates a lag of 12 hours behind UTC. The unincorporated, unorganized U.S. territories of Baker Island and Howland Island observe UTC-12. The two central Pacific islands place the instant of the 2019 December solstice at 4:19 p.m., Saturday, Dec. 21.

Baker Island and Howland Island’s locations in the Northern Hemisphere identify the December solstice as a winter solstice. The coral islands lie less than four degrees east of the International Date Line (IDL), the imaginary north-south line demarcating the change in calendar days in the IDL’s adjacent time zones. The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency lists geographic coordinates of 0 degrees 13 minutes north latitude, 176 degrees 28 minutes west longitude for Baker Island. Howland Island’s CIA-designated geographic coordinates are 0 degrees 48 minutes north latitude, 176 degrees 38 minutes west longitude.

The Territory of Wallis and Futuna (Territoire des îles Wallis-et-Futuna) lies less than four degrees west of the International Date Line. CIA geographic coordinates of 13 degrees 18 minutes south latitude, 176 degrees 12 minutes west longitude place the French overseas collectivity of three main volcanic islands in the Southern Hemisphere’s South Pacific Ocean.

The Wallis and Futuna archipelagos experience the 2019 December solstice as a summer solstice. With an offset of UTC+12, the Wallis and Futuna Time Zone is 12 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. The instant of the archipelagos’ 2019 summer solstice takes place Sunday, Dec. 22, at 4:19 p.m. WFT.

The easternmost time zone’s offset is UTC+14. The positive offset indicates the addition of 14 hours to UTC. The Republic of Kiribati’s Line Islands Time Zone has a time setting that is 14 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. The 2019 December solstice happens Sunday, Dec. 22, at 6:19 p.m. LINT for Kiritimati in the northern Line Islands.

Kiritimati lies in the Northern Hemisphere in the central Pacific Ocean. The raised coral atoll lies less than two degrees north of the equator. Kiritimati knows the December solstice as the announcer of astronomical winter.

The 2019 December solstice closes the year’s solstice lineup as the second of two annual solstices. The December solstice pairs with June’s solstice to balance June’s northern summer and southern winter with December’s northern winter and southern summer.

The takeaways for the 2019 winter solstice, which happens Sunday, Dec. 22, in the Northern Hemisphere, are that the December solstice occurs as a summer solstice in the Southern Hemisphere and that local time zones place the astronomical seasonal event on either Saturday, Dec. 21, or Sunday, Dec. 22.

Local time zone occurrences of the 2019 December solstice range from 12 hours before Coordinated Universal Time to 14 hours after UTC: U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s Standard Time Zones of the World, May 2018: The World Factbook, via U.S. Central Intelligence Agency

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

view of Dec. 21, 2010, solstice from space; SEVIRI (Spinning Enchanced Visible and Infrared Imager) on EUMETSAT’s (European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites) Meteosat-9 satellite: NASA Earth Observatory via NASA GSFC (Goddard Space Flight Center) Scientific Visualization Studio @ https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/11353

Local time zone occurrences of the 2019 December solstice range from 12 hours before Coordinated Universal Time to 14 hours after UTC: U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s Standard Time Zones of the World, May 2018: The World Factbook, via U.S. Central Intelligence Agency @ https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/graphics/ref_maps/physical/pdf/standard_time_zones_of_the_world.pdf

For further information:

Espenak, Fred. “Solstices and Equinoxes: 2001 to 2100 Greenwich Mean Time.” Astro Pixels > Ephemeris.
Available @ http://www.astropixels.com/ephemeris/soleq2001.html

Marriner, Derdriu. “2018 Winter Solstice Happens Friday, Dec. 21, in Northern Hemisphere.” Earth and Space News. Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2018.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2018/12/2018-winter-solstice-happens-friday-dec.html

Marriner, Derdriu. “December Solstice Always Occurs at the Same Instant Everywhere on Earth.” Earth and Space News. Wednesday, Nov. 30, 2016.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2016/11/december-solstice-always-occurs-at-same.html

Marriner, Derdriu. “December Solstice Opens Astronomical Winter With 2016’s Longest Night.” Earth and Space News. Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2016.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2016/12/december-solstice-opens-astronomical.html

Marriner, Derdriu. “December Winter Solstice Opens Northern Hemisphere’s Shortest Season.” Earth and Space News. Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2016.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2016/12/december-winter-solstice-opens-northern.html

Marriner, Derdriu. "Northern Latitudes Have Least Amount of Daylight Near December Solstice." Earth and Space News. Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2019.
Available @ https://earth-and-space-news.blogspot.com/2019/12/northern-latitudes-have-least-amount-of.html

Rutledge, Kim; Melissa McDaniel; Diane Boudreau; Tara Ramroop; Santani Teng; Erin Sprout; Hilary Costa; Hilary Hall; Jeff Hunt. “Hemisphere.” National Geographic Society > Encyclopedia. Last updated March 22, 2011.
Available @ https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/hemisphere/

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. “Field Listing: Geographic Coordinates.” Central Intelligence Agency > Library > Publications > The World Factbook.
Available @ https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2011.html

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. “Standard Time Zones of the World, May 2018.” Central Intelligence Agency > Library > Publications > The World Factbook.
Available @ https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/graphics/ref_maps/physical/pdf/standard_time_zones_of_the_world.pdf