We are accustomed to the passage of time, to the fact that on the planet the inhabitants of different countries and cities live according to their own, local hours. Who came up with this division, when did the states come to an agreement on this issue, and what interesting facts are connected with the phenomenon of a planetary scale, what is standard time?
How did you come up with time?
We will not consider such a grandiose concept as time in its true sense, but will only touch on its "waist" part. A bit of general information: it is generally accepted to consider the hours during which the Earth rotates around its axis as a day. This is the so-called solar day, the average duration of which is a little less than 24 hours.
The length of the day does not change depending on the geographical area. Only the current time in different parts of the planet changes. If before a person did not think about this fact, then the development of transport routes, business and economic ties led to the fact that the time difference began to cause some inconvenience.
The initiator of synchronization and allocation of different time zones was the Canadian Sandford Fleming. Naturally, Sir Fleming was not a simple resident of the country. He was a talented engineer whose creationbecame the railroad of Canada, and an enthusiastic traveller. It was the confusion in time in the process of travel, and then the movement of railway transport, that led to the introduction of standard time. The starting point for the world time system was 1885 (in some sources - 1883).
Basic principles of the system
On what basis was the division into time zones made? The idea is quite simple: the division passes along the meridians, which are indicated by numbers from 0 to 23. In each subsequent or previous time, it differs from the zero point by 1 hour. The time of the zero meridian, which passes through the British city of Greenwich, was taken as the initial one. Every 150 a new meridian runs and the time zone changes. Thus, standard time is the generally accepted system of time, determined by 24 meridians.
Fun Facts
As expected, the introduction of such a global system was not without incidents and just interesting facts. First, let's talk about those that affected standard time in Russia
- The system proposed by Sir Fleming was adopted in our state in 1919 (only a year later than the USA).
- In 1930, "maternity leave" time was introduced (+1 hour to standard time), which lasted until 1981. Its commissioning was justified by energy savings.
- The introduction of time zones led to the fact that the time for residents of different banks of the Ob in Novosibirsk differed by an hour. The dividing line runs along the river, but today,however, the clocks of Novosibirsk residents show the same time.
- During the existence of the USSR, the correction of time zones and time in them occurred about 40 times (annual transfer of hands to winter and summer time does not count).
Global Time Facts
- Date line. Passes along the 12th meridian. To the west of it, the time is shifted a day ahead relative to the eastern side. The moment when the same day (date) exists all over the world occurs only at the moment when it is midnight on the date line and noon on meridian 0.
- In the Pacific Line Islands, there is a 25-hour time difference with some locations.
- The time difference between Greenwich and Nepal is 5 hours 45 minutes.
- Crossing the border between Afghanistan and China will force the hands to move to 3.5 o'clock.
- An Englishman will say that if you turn your clock upside down, you can find out what time it is in India. All thanks to the fact that India has chosen for itself a difference of 5 ½ hours from the "zero" time.
This is it, standard time.
