Don't look so Long!

After working in depth with Latitude, we worked with Longitude. Both serve vital roles in determining coordinates on a map. First off lets start with a breakdown of Longitude.

Longitude- "A geographic coordinate that specifies the east-west position of a point on earths surface. They run in a North- South direction." though they inform about degrees East and West.  (As Seen Below).

Notice how on the figure above, they label a specific point named "Greenwich". That being Greenwich Observatory based out of England which is considered the point in which Longitude is neither East or West. This point is often referred to as the Prime Meridian (Prime meaning 1), meaning that this Meridian (another term for lines of longitude) is at 0°. We can also notice that it runs from the South Pole all the way to the North Pole. 

After working with Longitude, we began to work with UTC. 

"UTC, or Coordinated Universal Time is the primary time standard in which is used to regulate clocks and time." A region of the globe may use this standard of time for legal, commercial, and even social purposes. In order to figure time zones out, the 360° of our earth were taken and divided by our normal 24 hours, which would presumably get us a standard time every 15° of longitude, though its not that simple. In class we discussed how if a vital capital or even just a normal city lies on this time-dividing line, chances are that there's a minor adjustment for practical use. An example of an issue that would happen if this strategy was not implicated would be having to tell my friend that the time he wants to meet me is different for me then at his home in Maryland. 

Before I finish, let's shortly touch up on GMT. 

GMT- Greenwich Mean Time, just as the Prime Meridian runs through the Greenwich Observatory and starts the east and west measurements, UTC also starts at Greenwich Observatory. They don't receive the standard time of UTC +/- rather they receive just the standard time UTC 0. 

To represent that not every 15° of longitude has its own standard time, I've inserted this figure. 

Notice how as explained above, Greenwich England begins the UTC across our globe. Just as with the Prime Meridian, they aren't given a East or West coordinate as they aren't given a +/- time measurement, rather just a simple UTC 0. We can also see on the figure above how some Time Zones are altered as they run vertically to make it easier on the nations they run through.

That Concludes my October 1st Blog Post, Till next Time!