• Question: When is there 61 seconds in a minute?

    Asked by Supriya to Jackie, Michele, Oliver, Vicky, Yelong on 9 Mar 2015.
    • Photo: Jaclyn Bell

      Jaclyn Bell answered on 9 Mar 2015:


      The Earths rotation is slowing down so that days are getting longer (the effects of this are very very small – don’t worry schools hours wont change 😛 ) and every few years we need to add an extra second on to our time so that we are back in sync with atomic clocks. Atomic clocks use atoms to keep time, and are the most accurate method of timekeeping we have. It is important to keep the time on our clocks as close to atomic clocks as possible for things like satellite signals for TV, mobile phones, SatNavs, computing, etc. The next leap second will be added this year on 30th June 🙂

    • Photo: Michele Faucci Giannelli

      Michele Faucci Giannelli answered on 16 Mar 2015:


      By definition there will never be 61 second in a minute since a minute is defined as 60 second.

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