Michael Smith of Westminster took this photo of the sunset on June 6. It took on a reddish hue due to smoke from wildfires in the southwest.
Tuesday is the summer solstice! To be exact it arrives at 11:16 am. Most folks consider this to be the first day of summer, but, depending upon how you look at it we have already been in summer for 20 days.
There are two ways to look at when summer actually begins. The first is Meteorological Summer.The World Meteorological Association and most climatologists look at Summer beginning on June 1st. This is primarily for record keeping. So when we look back to see how hot, how cold, how wet or how dry a given summer has been the entire season is considered to be June, July and August. Here are how the seasons are broken down month by month for climate records:
WINTER: December, January, February
SPRING: March, April, May
SUMMER: June, July August
FALL: September, October, November
Astronomical Summer is what most people consider to be official summer-time. That would be from the Summer Solstice to the Fall Equinox. The solstice is when the sun hits its farthest point north of the equator. Depending upon where you live this may happen on June 20th or 21st. This year it is on June 21st at 11:16 am in Denver.
Solstice is a Latin word derived from the words Sol and Stitium which mean sun and to stop.
Either way you slice it Summer has arrived! Hope you have a great summer.
