Time used at sea.

[j.sabourn]

Not sure if this has been posted before, but as there are now people on site with no seafaring background they may like to know how important Time is to a seafarer. It is the basis of all navigation as we knew it....

The times used by seamen are Greenwich Mean Time ( G.M.T)...Local ( or Ships ) Mean Time ( LMT or SMT)..Zone Time ( ZT).. and Local or Ships Apparent time ( LAT or SAT)
Greenwich Mean Time is based on the passage of the mean sun across the meridian of Greenwich. It is universally adopted for navigational purposes and is sometimes referred to as Greenwich Civil Time , World Time, or Universal Time.
Local or Ships Mean Time is based on the passage of the mean sun across the meridian of the ships locality. It is GMT plus or minus the longitude of the position.
Zone Time is a time measured at every 15th. meridian and applies to the area 7.5 degrees on either side of it. All times are thus complete hours from 1 to 12 different from GMT those in East longitude being plus to GMT and those in West longitude being minus.
It applies only to the seas.
Local (or ships) Apparent Time is based on the passage of the true sun across the meridian of the ships position. The amount it differs from LMT is known as the Equation of Time.

JS

[happy daze john in oz]

I still use the 24 hour clock system, much to the annoyance of may who do not understand how it works.

[j.sabourn]

The most important time of the day is when the sun is over the yardarm John. JS

[Louis the fly]

For the average seaman the most important times were opening time, meal time, knocking off time and of course short time.

[j.sabourn]

Long time got the knock then Louis , didn’t want the overtime ! JS

[Duke Drennan]

For the average seaman the most important times were opening time, meal time, knocking off time and of course short time.

Brilliant Louis !!!

[Colin Wood]

Hi JS, I still think the most important time at sea, was seatime. ie the time needed to sit tickets and get promoted. Hence 'The working class can kiss my ****, I've got a 3rd. mates job at last.

[j.sabourn]

Yes without seatime a so called seaman is just a sheep in wolfs clothing a mascarader , a pretender of something he isn’t. A seaman without a ship is like a man without a woman. Or a fish without a tail, someone made a song similar . Cheers Juliett Whiskey Sierra. How does one get the whiskey out of JWS without breaking the bottle as the empty one is now worth 10 cents.

[happy daze john in oz]

And at some time somewhere across the world the sun is always over the yard arm

[j.sabourn]

So rounding off this time gentlemen please business, and as time is getting shorter by the day the older we get.
If the genii out of the magic lamp appeared and said you had X number of years left and which ones did you want .
Which one would you pick.?
A Solar year equals 365 days. 5 hours.48 minutes . 57 seconds.
A Sidereal year equals 365 days 6 hours 9 minutes 9.4 seconds
A Solar day is 24 hours
A Lunar day is 24 hours 48 minutes
A Sidereal day is 23 hours 56 minutes 3.4 seconds.

Of course you’ll have to take your chances with climate change and trust it doesn’t affect the passage of the earth through. The heavens. This could be the alteration of its tilt may have some bearing on which time you ask for. JS