New Year’s Day 2017 will be delayed — but just by a second

The New Year will be delayed by a second, owing to a slowdown in the Earth’s rotation.

According to a BBC report, the extra second will occur as clocks strike midnight and a time of 23:59:60 will be recorded, delaying 2017 momentarily.

It said a leap second last occurred in June 2015, and that this would be the 27th time such would be occurring.

“The change is required because standard time lags behind atomic clocks,” it said.

“The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) — responsible for the UK’s national time scale — uses the atomic clock to provide a stable and continuous timescale.

“Along with other clocks across the globe, it provides the world with its coordinated universal time.”

Peter Whibberley, NPL senior research scientist, was quoted as saying: “Atomic clocks are more than a million times better at keeping time than the rotation of the Earth, which fluctuates unpredictably.

“Leap seconds are needed to prevent civil time drifting away from Earth time.

“Although the drift is small – taking around 1,000 years to accumulate a one-hour difference – if not corrected it would eventually result in clocks showing midday before sunrise.”

Atomic clocks use the change of electron energy levels to tell the time.

The time created by the clocks is used in GPS location devices and is used to control the wave frequency of television broadcasts.

The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service in France tracks the Earth’s rotation and announces the need for a leap second.