Two dates
Why today is the beginning of spring (again).
The beginning of spring is on March 1st – and then again on March 20th late in the evening
© aal.photo / Imago Images
It’s finally the beginning of spring. The warmer season officially begins this Wednesday. However, its launch was announced a good two and a half weeks ago. Why these two different dates?
The first date is the beginning of meteorological spring on March 1st. Researchers chose this day to make their work a little easier: for statistical reasons, the weather experts calculate their data in full months.
It was the World Meteorological Organization, a sub-organization of the United Nations, that once determined when, from their point of view, the beginning of spring was: for the northern hemisphere of the earth on exactly March 1st.
By the way, the rule doesn’t just apply to spring: this association generally placed the beginning of seasons at the beginning of the month. This makes it easier to compare weather statistics or climate data. A season is always three months long: in our latitudes, winter is from December to February, spring is between March and May, summer is from June to August, and autumn begins in September.
According to another calculation, we were still in winter at the beginning of March. Because there is another date for the beginning of spring – that is the astronomical or calendar one.
The calendar start of spring is calculated according to the celestial constellation
As the name suggests, this is based on celestial conditions and is calculated precisely for each year and therefore varies each time. This year the calendar start of spring falls on Wednesday, March 20th. Because on that day the sun is vertically above the equator and from then on moves north.
This celestial constellation could be predicted down to the minute: At exactly 4:06 a.m. our time, winter was over on this Wednesday morning. Astronomers also call the day of the beginning of spring the equinox because each region of the earth receives exactly 12 hours of daylight.
Since many people are probably longingly waiting for sunnier times after the dark season, it’s actually quite nice that you can enjoy the beginning of spring twice.
Sources: RND knowledge“Augsburger Allgemeine”
Read at stern+: Whether in the palace gardens of Sanssouci, in the green belt of the metropolis or in your own vegetable patch – where nature thrives, people also live properly.