The northernmost city in the United States will be seeing sunlight for the first time since November.
The city of Utqiaġvik, Alaska, more commonly known from its former name Barrow (changed in 2016) will see the sun rise above the horizon for the first time since November 18. That is 65 days of darkness!
However, the sun approaches near the horizon, so they have seen twilight, dawn, and dusk, but no direct sunlight.
Utqiaġvik will see roughly 25 minutes of sunlight Monday. Tuesday, about 1 hour 20 minutes.
They rapidly gain daylight until late spring when the sun will stay above the horizon through the rest of summer – that’s 24 hours of straight daylight! Due to the tilt of Earth’s axis, much of northern Alaska stays dark in the winter and bright in the summer.
Utqiaġvik is a peculiar place. It lies about 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. It is the northernmost town in the United States, and the 11th northernmost settlement in the entire world. The latest U.S. census put the population just over 4,000 people.
