Autumnal Equinox is This Weekend, here is What You Can Expect from The Solar Event

Saturday will bring nearly equal amounts of sunlight and nighttime. What are you going to do to celebrate this equal day on the autumnal equinox?

equal day and night — The autumnal equinox will mean equal daylight and nighttime across the globe.

The official start of fall is this weekend! The sun will be directly above the equator Saturday marking the official start of fall. This will mean everywhere across the globe will see about 12 hours of daylight and nighttime.

Why do we have an equinox?

The equinox, like a solstice, occurs due to the tilt of the earth. The earth’s axis is tilted about 23.4° causing us to have seasons throughout the year. During the year, the axis is either tilted towards or away from the sun.

The sun rules all the seasons on Earth. So, how does the amount of sunlight change each season?

Winter

In the winter, one hemisphere is tilted away from the sun. Therefore, there is a lack of energy emitted into the half of the earth and temperatures are cooler.

Spring

At the vernal equinox, the earth is tilted so that the suns direct rays fall over the equator. This means the planet is not tilted towards nor away from the sun. This yields the transition season from winter to summer. As the season goes on, the earth becomes more tilted towards the sun ushering in summer.

Summer

During the summer, the axis is tilted towards the earth. This is why temperatures get so hot, it is because there are more direct rays on that hemisphere.

Fall

On the autumnal equinox, the earth is again not tilted towards nor away from the sun. We again see nearly the same amount of day and night on this day. However, the planet continues orbiting around the sun changing the orientation of the tilt. This is a transition into winter as we lose daylight each day until the winter solstice.

Each day from Saturday on, the northern hemisphere will see 1 less minute daylight. This will continue through the winter solstice.

Latin origin

This phenomenon has always occurred on the planet. So, the term for equal daylight and nighttime comes from the Latin language.

The first half of the word originates from the word aeqqus meaning equal. The second half comes from the word nox meaning night. Thus, we get equinox, equal-night, night is equal to day during this event.

Not exactly equal

The days are not entirely equal across the globe. Higher latitudes will see a couple minutes of more daylight than those near the equator. The equator will see around 12 hours and 7 minutes of daylight while higher latitudes will reach 12 hours and 16 minutes Saturday.