Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Thursday, December 1st.  The sun will rise at 7:58.  It’ll be up for 9 hours and 4 minutes, setting at 5:03.   The moon, 1 day before first quarter, will set at 12:12 tomorrow morning.

December is the month with the shortest daylight hours.  Winter will officially arrive at the winter solstice on the 22nd at 12:30 a.m.  There will be little movement in the sunset times: In the Traverse City/Interlochen area this will be from 5:03 tonight, down to 5:02 and then advancing to 5:11 at the end of the month.  There is more movement in the sunrise times which will advance from 7:58 tomorrow to 8:19 on the 31st.    There is also little movement of daylight hours.  The noontime sun will dip from 23 ½ degrees to a bit less than 22 degrees above the southern horizon on the 22nd, before ascending to 22 1/3 degrees on New Years Eve.  For the straits area the sun will be a degree, or two sun widths lower than these.

* Times, as always are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan.