What is the White Nights Phenomenon? The interesting causes of the white night phenomenon

What is white night? What is white night phenomenon? Let's learn about the interesting white night phenomenon together.

What exactly are “white nights” and what causes them?

This is the name of the phenomenon of twilight that lasts all night. From an astronomical point of view, twilight is understood as the period of time when the Sun is at a shallow position below the horizon.

During the white nights, natural light remains at its peak. The brightest nights fall on June 21-22. In general, the duration of the white nights depends on the specific region and can start as early as May 25-26 and end as late as July 16-17.

This interesting phenomenon can be observed in temperate and high latitudes before and immediately after the summer solstice in a fairly large area of ​​Russia, as well as throughout Finland and Iceland, in most of Scandinavia, as well as in some parts of Estonia, Great Britain, the United States and Canada.

So why do we have White Nights? Let's find out more!

Causes of white nights

The Earth's axis of rotation is tilted at an angle of 23.4 degrees relative to the perpendicular to the orbital plane. This tilt causes summer in either the Northern or Southern Hemisphere to have a gradually increasing length of daylight with increasing latitude. And when reaching a certain value of latitude, the Sun will not set for a number of days, causing the phenomenon of white nights.

White nights phenomenon in Russia

In Russia, the phenomenon of white nights occurs from mid-May to mid-July, when summer comes. During that time, Russia has days when the sun seems to never set.

Saint Petersburg - where the altitude is suitable, the landscape is open and the air is cool, is the easiest place to observe the white night phenomenon. Here, the white night usually lasts from June 11 to July 2 every year. When the white night occurs here, the sun usually sets at 23:25, the day is 18 hours and 50 minutes long.

The white night phenomenon also occurs in some other places in the world including:

• Stockholm, Sweden : When the white nights occur, the sun will set at 10:08 p.m., and the day will last 18 hours and 37 minutes.
• Helsinki, Finland : On the summer solstice, the sun sets at 10:50 p.m., and the day lasts 18 hours and 55 minutes.
• Iqaluit, Canada : On white nights, the sun sets at 11:01 p.m., and the day lasts 20 hours and 49 minutes.
• Reykjavik, Iceland : The shortest night of the year has a day that lasts 21 hours and 8 minutes and the sun sets at 01:04.
• Longyearbyen, Norway : Here, the duration of continuous daylight is 3,094 hours and 56 minutes, and the sun does not set from 1:52 a.m. on April 20 until 0:49 a.m. on August 22.
• Riga, Latvia : On Jani or the summer solstice, in Riga the sun sets at 00:04, and the day is 21 hours and 8 minutes long.
• Paris, France : When the white night phenomenon occurs, the sun sets at 9:58 p.m. and the day lasts 16 hours and 10 minutes.
• Salisbury, England : The sun sets at 9:26 p.m., and the day is 16 hours and 33 minutes long on the day of the White Nights.