Spring Forward: It’s time to change those clocks this weekend
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Some people love it, some people don’t but wherever you land in the ongoing debate, you still have to adjust your clock for Daylight Savings Time twice a year (if you’re in Alabama at least).
And one of those occurrences is this weekend.
The “spring forward” event is the start of Daylight Savings Time. Clocks will officially jump forward from 1:59AM on Sunday morning to 3AM.
While it actually won’t add any sunlight to our days, it will just push the sunset (along with the sunrise) back one hour which makes the days feel a little longer.
- Saturday, March 7: Sunrise – 6:07AM | Sunset – 5:49PM
- Sunday, March 8: Sunrise – 7:06AM | Sunset – 6:49PM
More sunlight?
The short answer is yes, there will be more daylight but that has nothing to do with the time change. The time change doesn’t actually save any light but if you’re not an early riser, you’ll probably get to enjoy more of it.
The time change coincides with the changing of seasons as days will seem longer due to the Earth’s rotation.
In the next two weeks, we will see our daylight time pass 12 hours per day. And that number will continue to grow until the summer solstice (June 20) which will have 14 hours + 23 minutes of daylight.
History of Daylight Savings Time
Adjusting the day around the amount of sunlight has likely been going on for centuries, dating back to ancient civilizations. But here in the U.S., Daylight Savings Time as we know was officially put into place by the Uniform Time Act of 1966.
In 2007, a slight shift to Daylight Savings Time was made, extending it to cover around 65 percent of the year.
Daylight saving time in the U.S. starts on the second Sunday in March and ends on the first Sunday in November. Every state except Hawaii and Arizona practices the two annual time changes.
In recent years, Alabama has debated and even voted on staying on Daylight Savings Time throughout the entire year but no official changes have passed.
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