Updraft: June 26, 2009 Archive

Latest sunsets of the year this weekend

Posted at 3:07 PM on June 26, 2009 by Paul Huttner (0 Comments)

Sunset on Lake Minnetonka near Big Island Thursday evening.

It may not be the land of the midnight sun, but Minnesotans are enjoying the latest sunset times of the year this weekend.

Sunset in the Twin Cities is at 9:04 p.m. tonight through this weekend. That means it's reasonably light on clear evenings well past 9:30 p.m. As you move north and west in Minnesota, sunset times are even later. The sun will set in Hallock, in the far northwest corner of Minnesota, at 9:35 p.m. tonight. It's noticeably light in the evening this time of year in northwest Minnesota until nearly 10:30 p.m.

The later sunsets and long evening twilight provide valuable extra time for outdoor evening activities this time of year. They also occur a week after the summer solstice due to a quirk in earth's orbit. Because earth's orbit is an ellipse instead of a circle, small differences in sunrise and sunset times occur near the solstice. That results in the latest sunsets of the year coming just after the summer solstice. A similar quirk effects sunrise and sunset times near the winter solstice.

Here are some sample sunset times tonight around Minnesota.

Rochester 8:57 p.m.
Mankato 9:03 p.m.
Twin Cities 9:04 p.m.
Duluth 9:06 p.m.
St. Cloud 9:10 p.m.
Willmar 9:11 p.m.
Nisswa 9:14 p.m.
International Falls 9:20 p.m.
Moorhead 9:25 p.m.
Roseau 9:30 p.m.

You can find sunrise and sunset time for your location here.

Enjoy the "midnight sun" this weekend!

PH

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