Saturday, 24 October 2009

the sun - Are ascending node of sun, the point of intersection of prime meridian and equator and center of earth all collinear?

Not exactly.



During either of the equinoxes there is a moment when the line between center of earth and the sun aligns with the equator (as opposed to just crossing it twice daily). This doesn't coincide with prime meridian in any way though; it may happen at any meridian whatsoever that happens to coincide with the line.



Of course if it happens the sun is in zenith above prime meridian at that moment, your conditions will be satisfied. But depending on precision you allow, that may be a very short time window. It's all about how precisely you want that to be.



Near Equinox Earth tilts by about 0.25 degree of latitude per day, meaning that is the maximum angle by which the line will be off from equator while crossing the prime meridian on the same day as when Equinox happens. 0.25 degree of latitude is about 27 kilometers, so this is the maximum error. Of course on some years, that will be much less, it's just that Earth tilt is correlated with length of year, zenith line crossing of prime meridian is correlated with time of day, and time of day is not really correlated with length of year.

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