September 2026 - On & Off Earth
September is a sneaky month. This first week, there is little doubt it is still summer but change, as always, is creeping in from all directions. The first sneaky change I noticed, back in mid-August, was the sunlight bypassing my overhanging eaves and shining onto my desk. The loss of daylight is subtle in the early summer but is picking up speed as Earth’s tilted orbit sees the sun wrap up its annual northern hemisphere tour at the Autumnal Equinox at 8:05pm on the 22nd.
Because Earth’s atmosphere bends the sun’s rays, the day of actual ‘equal night’ (equinox), and day, is four days later on the 26th with both sunrise and set at 7:01EDT. No longer sneaking, we lose 70 minutes of sunlight in September, 25 minutes in the morning, a whopping 45 minutes at sunset.
I would like to sneak in early to the debate that will fire up again in late October: Day Light Saving Time. In a less agrarian society, moving the ‘extra’ hour of light to the evening for the spring and summer is a great idea. It’s the delay in the shift, the Fall Back, until early November that causes the shock to our world. Falling back, in early Fall (?last Sunday in September or 1st in October?) when there are still almost 12 hours of light makes much more sense.
Sadly, it’s not common sense and safety driving the debate but greed. The candy industry has lobbied hard to get another hour of daylight for trick or treating, big recreation for another month of golf. As a retired teacher, I guess I just have more concern for the safety of kids not waiting in the dark at the morning bus stop than getting a little more sugar in their diet or a handful of people getting in a few extra rounds of golf. Year round DST means Christmas sunrise is at 8:23am.
There is sneakiness going on in the skies around Earth in September, too. Venus’ reign as the Evening Star is winding down. Our nearest planetary neighbor is catching Earth in the solar derby. Its last evening visit with a lunar crescent on the 13th and 14th. Venus will next visit a lunar crescent as the Morning Star in November.
Later sunrises means more people can sneak a peak at the morning sky as the visible outer planets arc across that pre-dawn sky. Jupiter is the bright ‘star’ just above eastern horizon, Mars, always reddish, is a little higher up. Saturn, slow in the solar derby is now visible most of the night, into the southwest by dawn. The Full Corn Moon will be above the ringed planet on the 26th. The sun drifts from Leo into Virgo on the 17th.
This September 11th marks 25 years since that day none of us will every forget; did it sneak by? About 1/3 of the US population was not yet alive on that nightmare of a day; a wild, somewhat sneaky thought itself. Remembrances and tributes will gush forth this year but embroiled in another war in the region, it seems we have learned little from that fateful day.
The above average rainfall of July and August, even without a single hurricane in the Atlantic, has seen green grass replace brown, corn grow tall and drought maps no longer feature as a nightly news item. Mosquitoes and tent spiders are an item on my September forest walks but I swat the webs down with a stick and keep moving to avoid the skeeters. Hope you get a chance to sneak outside, wander around on your planet and enjoy the delights that September has to offer. They far outweigh the perils!
Today On Earth
Glacier National Park
Where there should be glaciers?
But, the planet is warming
Direct evidence:
Glaciers melt!!
"gonna end the war in Ukraine
On day 1"
If he's talking...he's lying!!
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