Stop the World a Second

GET ready for a minute with 61 seconds. Scientists are delaying the start of 2006 by the first "leap second" -- a timing tweak to make up for changes in the Earth's rotation -- in seven years. At midnight Co-ordinated Universal Time (11am Melbourne time), atomic clocks worldwide will read 23:59:60 before hitting 00:00:00. A leap second is added to keep uniform timekeeping within 0.9 seconds of the Earth's rotational time, which can speed up or slow down because of many factors, including tides. "Enjoy New Year's Eve a second longer," the US National Institute of Standards and Technology said in an explanatory notice. The first leap second was added on June 30, 1972; from 1999 until recently, the two time standards have been in close enough synch to avoid any need to add a leap second. Precise time measurements are needed for high-speed communications systems, among other modern technologies.

Okay, now this's certainly an interesting piece of news. Truely, it's the first time I've ever heard of such a concept. And to think that a minute actually consisted of 61 seconds a few years before my birth, it certainly seems astounding! First came the Y2K bug and now this! Oh boy, for the sake of technology, dunno how much precise we need to be. I'm certainly blown!

Related Posts by Glossary