For you Far Northerners, for how long is it never truly dark in the summer?

[Lord Jubjub]

I thought of posting this in the Q&A section, but thought better of it.

For anyone living in the far north (or far south for that matter), how many days (as in rotations of the Earth) do you have that the sky is never really dark?

[captain swoop]

I live in North Yorkshire and we only get about 4 hours of real darkness in midsummer.

[HenrikOlsen]

In Denmark, what we call "de lyse nætter" (lit. the light nights) which are defined as those night where we don't get darker than astronomical twilight i.e sun is always less that 18 degrees below the horizon, are from about 5th of May to 8th of August.
And it definitely doesn't get really dark.

[Ara Pacis]

You have to be above the arctic (or antarctic) circle to have day without night. Anything south will have have days that are less than a day long.

[Van Rijn]

You have to be above the arctic (or antarctic) circle to have day without night. Anything south will have have days that are less than a day long.

Yes, but you don't have to be that far up to experience midnight twilight where the nights never gets really dark.

I remember that well from the time I lived in Alaska (I also remember the short winter days with the low, low sun - I didn't like those).

[PetersCreek]

Similar to Henrik's locale, we got no darker than astronomical twilight here in Peters Creek between April 18th and August 25th of this year. Things change pretty quickly on either side of that period, though. As I type this, we're supposed to have 2h:17m of official darkness.

[korjik]

Then I go check out Google maps and realize that Houston is about the same latitude as Cairo!?!

[korjik]

I always find it kind of suprising when I get reminded that the US is really quite a bit farther south than Europe. Alaska and Denmark near the same latitude?!?

[PetersCreek]

I always find it kind of suprising when I get reminded that the US is really quite a bit farther south than Europe. Alaska and Denmark near the same latitude?!?

Yep, much of the U.S. is south of Europe proper. Overall, we range from about 24° 31' at Ballast Key, Florida to 71° 23' at Point Barrow, Alaska. That's well south of Svalbard but just a tad farther north of mainland Europe's northernmost point, if I'm not mistaken.

My house sits at 61° 24'.

[Substantia Innominata]

I always find it kind of suprising when I get reminded that the US is really quite a bit farther south than Europe. Alaska and Denmark near the same latitude?!?

It's the same with me. Only I don't think it's got to do with an underestimation as to the size or extent of North America, at least not in my case. I'd guess, instead, it's rooted in a simple misconception, or overstatement, concerning the actual impact of the factor 'latitude' alone and the (wrongly) expected similarity (in climate, appearance, maybe even mentality of the respecitve populations) of quite different localities resulting merely from a comparable latitude. When in fact it's of course only one of many factors in determining a particular climate and associated aspects.

Some time ago, when I realized that the cities of Seattle and Vancouver actually are located considerably further down south, than my own location in Germany, I had quite a similar moment of surprise. Could hardly believe it at first?! But my explanation for it was close at hand, the misconception story: Since, to me as a European, the very NW parts of (the contiguous) US/the most SW parts of Canada give an impression not so unlike that of, at least parts of, Scandinavia. Be it only superficially. I think that's why, mentally, I tend to assume this region much further north than it is in fact. (Still do.. even though a couple years ago I could actually watch spectacular northern lights.. at home!) Same with Houston/Cairo, one considers only the (many as there are) differences. Or take Glasgow.. practically shares its latitude with Moscow!

Overall, we range from about 24° 31' at Ballast Key, Florida to 71° 23' at Point Barrow, Alaska. That's well south of Svalbard but just a tad farther north of mainland Europe's northernmost point, if I'm not mistaken.

Continental Europe's northernmost point would be Kinnarodden, which is located on the Nordkinn Peninsula, in Norway, lying at 71° 08'. So you're bang on target: just a tad indeed.

Whenever anyone wants to know, if it's right now still dark 'up there', I recommend a simple remedy by means of one of the many webcams around the globe. A really nice one (and very reliable, although not 'live streaming') is that of the University of Tromsø's department of Computer Science; it's a weather observational camera, overlooking quite much of Tromsø and you get all kinds of current weather data, too, from, at least, 69° 40' N:

http://weather.cs.uit.no/

[kleindoofy]

I always find it kind of suprising when I get reminded that the US is really quite a bit farther south than Europe. ...

Being from Boston I always find it hard the believe that Boston and Rome are (more or less) on the same latitude.

It must be some kind of NASA conspiracy.

On the same hand mainland Europeans tend to think that England is much farther North than it really is. London actually lies on about the same latitude as Holland's southern border.

In addition to that, England uses the GMT time zone (aka WET/UTC+0) which is one hour behind CET, but Spain uses CET, although much of the coutry lies west of England.

[Ara Pacis]

It's not uncommon for Europeans to underestimate the size and extent of the US.

[AndreasJ]

The southernitude of the continental US no longer surprises me, but I got a minor shock the other day when I realized that Cape Horn is about as far south of the equator as the southern end of Sweden is north of it. I think of the former as practically Antarctic, but the later is a balmy place where they don't get proper winters.

[Ara Pacis]

I live in what is considered a northern state in the snow belt, and I am still closer to the equator than to the pole. Climate is a major point of comparison, but hours of light and darkness aren't affected by climate, unless you're counting cloudiness.

[kleindoofy]

People also tend to get north and south positions out of sync.

People normally think that Chile is south of California, while it's really directly south of New York.

[AndreasJ]

People also tend to get north and south positions out of sync.

People normally think that Chile is south of California, while it's really directly south of New York.

Swedes tend to think that Sweden stretches N-S, when it's really more like NNE-SSW. You can often surprise people by pointing out that Haparanda (on the Finnish border) is far east of Visby (on an island in the middle of the Baltic).

[Atraveller]

People also tend to get north and south positions out of sync.

People normally think that Chile is south of California, while it's really directly south of New York.

And Pelee Island (Canada's most southern point) is further south than the boarder of California/Oregon...

[captain swoop]

Our Latitude is 54.5333 Longitude -1.0554

[tnjrp]

I live in the Southern (well, South-Western to be exact) Finland and on for the shortest night of the year we have the following:
- Sunset at 21:50
- Nautical twilight begins at 23:42
- Civil twilight begins at 01:02
- Sunrise at 02:54

So the sky is really dark only for a little over an hour.

[danscope]

" Still.....no sight of land. How long is it? "
" ...That's a rather personal question, Sir. "