A Matter of Degrees, Pt. 2
Robert Norton
rnorton at unm.edu
Fri Sep 26 18:28:29 CDT 1997
Actually, WWV and WWVH's clocks are at Ft Collins, CO, They used to be in Washington, DC, at the Naval Observatory. Their time now is UTC (Universal Time Coordinated) and they've never had anything to do with the "atomic" clocks at Greenwich (although back in the '50's they did agree with the Greenwich clocks and the term Greenwich Mean Time was used). "Nut" Meg Thatcher had the Greenwich clocks shut down a decade ago to save money and in that instant, Greenwich Mean Time disappeared forever after a 200+ year run. We still get leap seconds, as they are called, added every few years. Sometimes even twice a year.There are actually two different flavors of UTC time but I'll bet no one cares.
>The clock on which
>it is based is an atomic variety housed at Greenwich (tenuous P content
>here?), and the hour given is always Greenwich Mean Time. Anyway, they
>always recalibrate the Greenwich clock on New Year's Eve, and for many
>years listening to the shift between the beeps was among the biggest hoots
>of my partying career. Of course, it would happen at like, 7 pm my time, so
>I still didn't have an excuse to stay up late
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