In our part of the world we take
for granted that the sun rises and drops behind the horizon twelve hours a day.
So generally work is done during the day, and we go to sleep during the night.
In some parts of the world, they get six months of sunshine and six months of
darkness; whilst in our part of the world we get twelve short hours of sunshine
and twelve short hours of darkness, daily.
Where then do these strange yet
true phenomena take place in the world? The answer is the North and South
poles. For the six months that the North Pole is experiencing sunshine, the
South will be experiencing darkness, and vice versa. In this post I am going to
focus on the North Pole.
The North Pole is a place in the
Northern Hemisphere where Planet Earth’s axis of rotation touches the Earth.
The Northern Hemisphere is the one half of the Earth above the equator. The
other half is the Southern Hemisphere. The North Pole sits on water, the Arctic
Ocean, covered with shifting ice. Because of the shifting ice it is difficult
to build a permanent station for exploration purposes. It is the farthest point northwards, on Earth.
All lines of longitude meet there and are directed southwards.
The Earth’s axis is an imaginary
line that runs through the North and South poles, and the Earth spins around
it. The line is slanted at 66.5 degrees from the Earth’s orbital plane. The
axial tilt or the tilt of the axis is technically called obliquity. Axial tilt
is the angle between the rotational axis and orbital axis. The Earth’s axial
tilt is approximately 23.5 degrees.
The deepness of the sea at the
North Pole has been measured by the Russian Mir submersible in 2007 at 4261 m. (13980
ft.), and in 1958 by the USS Nautilus at 4087m. (13410 ft.). The nearest land,
supposed to be Kaffeklubben Island, off the northern coast of Greenland, is
about 700 km .( 341 mi.) away. The nearest inhabited place is Alert, in the
Qikiqtaaluk Region, Nunavut, Canada, which is placed 817km. (508 mi.) from the
Pole.
Under international law, no
country owns the North Pole or the region of the Arctic Ocean surrounding it.
The five countries surrounding the Ocean, Russia, Canada, Norway, Denmark (via
Greenland) and the United States, are limited to 200 nautical miles around
their coasts. The area beyond their coasts is under the management of the
International Seabed Authority.
What causes the North Pole to
experience six months continuous sunshine? You may know that the Earth orbits
the Sun from a distance of 150,000,000 km. In the course of orbiting the Sun
the Earth’s axis (North Pole) is either directed towards or away from the Sun.
When it is directed towards the Sun, it gets sunlight. And it will be so for
six continuous months, as in Africa we get twelve continuous hours of sunlight
in a day, daily, throughout the year!
When it is directed away from the Sun darkness occurs, alternatively for
six continuous months. The Sun rises in March and sets in September. There is a
twilight period of between two to seven weeks before sunrise and sunset. When
the Sun rises it gets to its highest level in June, after which time it begins
to drop below the horizon in September, and thereby ushering in darkness.
Whilst the North Pole is
experiencing sunshine directed towards the Sun, the South Pole will be
experiencing darkness directed away from the Sun. There is alternation between
the two poles.
You may be wondering whether
there are life forms there. The answer is that there are hardly life forms
there. Life forms do not have habitat at the North Pole because there is no
land mass there. A member of a Russian team that dropped unto the North Pole
seabed in August, 2007 reported seeing no sea animals there, though it was
later reported that some sea creatures were scooped from the seabed.
In the North Pole no time zone
has been determined. In most parts of the Earth because of the daily sunshine
it is easy to determine time. At least when the sun is at its highest you know
it is midday. The situation is different at the North Pole where the Sun takes
three months to get to its highest level.
In the North Pole the Sun shines
for six months in a year, yearly. It experiences darkness for another six
months in a year. The North Pole is a place in the Northern hemisphere where
the Earth’s axis meets its surface. The opposite point is the South Pole. The
North Pole experiences six months sunshine and six months darkness because of a
tilt in the axis. When the axis tilt towards the Sun when the Earth is orbiting
the Sun, there is sunshine, for six months ; when it tilts away from the Sun
there is darkness, for six months.
Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Pole
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