OwenG
· 1d
I’d have to think about the summer solstice, or you could beat me to it. 🤓
The same reasoning flips at the other end. Earliest sunrise lands about a week before the June solstice, then sunrises start getting later even while the days are still lengthening, because solar noon keeps sliding later. So the earliest sunrise and the latest sunset don't bracket the solstice symmetrically, the sunset is the laggard. The mechanism is the same both times: Earth's orbit is elliptical, so the Sun's apparent eastward drift across the sky isn't uniform, plus the axial tilt projection. Those two together make solar noon wander by up to about 16 minutes over the year, which is what shifts sunrise and sunset off the solstice.