Off phone with mum and she says it's still SUNNY in Northern Ireland. It is dark her and has been since just after 5 which is dissapointing.

I am getting very tired of these short days. On the weekend I get up at 12pm so I have barely 5 hours to play with, by the time i'm finished all my work it's after 6 which means i've sat inside and missed the daylight.

It feels like it's been like this for an eternity now, i'm getting sick of these short days. When is this going to end? Will it still be getting dark at 6 here in April?

I can't wait to the summer when it's bright to 11pm.

Well it's still light here in the West, but of course it would be lighter later

I never think of the day as being short when it's going dark at 5:30ish. Then again, I don't like it being light at 10:30pm and children struggling to go to sleep on a school night.

Well as I said I got up at 12pm today so by the time I got washed, dressed, cleaned and eat it was 3pm, now i'm doing my coursework and it's dark already so i've basically wasted a day sitting inside doing work.

I had planned to go out for a walk but not when it's pitch black. If it would at least stay bright to 7 at least then I could go out of the flat and go somewhere instead of being stuck here.

(I have looked at sunsets from here and the whole way up to mid March the sunset is before 6pm so I guess I will just have to grin and bear it. Sunset will jump to 8:30pm when I go home at Easter as clocks go forward).

You're acting like you've never experienced a UK winter before.

Plus it's your fault you stayed in bed till noon...

No. It does get dark here alot earlier than home, the earliest it was dark here was before 4pm in December which is crazy.

At home it never gets dark before 4:30. Also right now I think it's bright to 6 there.

This has got do go down as one of the strangest threads ever on DS.

sorry we aren't as bland as you.

But it gets lighter in Norfolk earlier than it does in NI, so it's swings and roundabouts. Plus, the fact that Norfolk is farther south than NI means the day will be slightly longer than in NI at this time of year (albeit by not much!)

Also, this link proves the sun sets in Belfast at 3:58 PM from 8 - 14 December, so I don't see how your claim that "At home it never gets dark before 4:30" could possibly be true:

http://www.timeanddate.com/sun/uk/be...h=12&year=2016

My favourite picture is the analemma of the sun

Ok others have done it since but I like the original best.

It shows clearly why the sunrise and sunset varies through the year.

If you want more time to do the things you want at this time of year, the solution is simple, get up earlier. It's starting to get light at 7am where I live.

I live in East Londonderry, my earliest sunset is 4pm and it takes longer to get darker up there.

Wow a whole two minutes compared to Belfast.

Sorry, but on a really grey December day in Derry there's no way it stays light till 4:30pm. I feel you may be looking at the situation with rose tinted spectacles...

Well, East Anglia is a lot further east than Northern Ireland so you're going to have earlier sunrises and earlier sunsets. Great for early birds, not so great for those that like to sleep in or stop out late.

Northern Ireland
Sunrise Today: 07:55
Sunset Today: 17:33

East Anglia
Sunrise Today: 07:12
Sunset Today: 17:03

http://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/uk/lowestoft
http://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/uk/londonderry


Just get up earlier to get the extra daylight or advance your bedroom clock by half an hour.

But everything's better in NI according to Big brother tv.

Big difference in daylight times between the two places. Will be like going forward two hours when you go home and the clocks go forward at the same time. Bet it feels like the clocks change every time you go to and from home!

Yes it does lol. I went home the other week and it was like I got an extra hour in my day lol.

It will be interesting to see what it's like when I go back in May when it's getting dark at 10.

Sunrise/sunset is affected by the angle of the terminator which changes throughout the year.


Here is a map which allows you to investigate how it changes throughout the year.

I don't mind February you know spring is around the corner starting to get lighter at nights, it's 4.25pm & still clear daylight, & sunny will so be light for another hour, you notice the days getting longer towards the end of January when sunset is around 4.30pm onwards

Although sunset is 1716 in my locale true night dont start until 1911. Something to do with civil nautical and astronomical twilight

It's still sunny!

Highly doubt that.

I'm hoping that March will give me enough daylight to get six holes of golf in. Should be nine by end of March and of course when the clocks go back (only a little over a month to go - yay - I should be able to get 18 in.

Happy days are here to stay.

..well for a few months anyway.

I normally let mine spring forward

Look at the timeanddate.com website. Click on the world map and you will see it goes from sunset,civil twilight,nautical twilight,astronomical twilight then night

In summer there is no night just astronomical twilight depending on your locale. lerwick just has civil twilight in the summer

I know that. I live above 55N so I experience NAUTICAL twilight all night in the summer.

You do not have long summer nights compared to me.

When I watch the BBC News from London in the summer it is dark by 9 and we still have the sun up for another 90 minutes.