Tomorrow is the first day of fall. Here are five things you should know.
1. The official first day of fall is tomorrow. But the first MINUTE of fall depends on what time zone you're in. Fall starts tomorrow at exactly 9:54 P.M. Eastern . . . 8:54 P.M. Central . . . 7:54 P.M. Mountain . . . and 6:54 P.M. Pacific.
2. It's known as the Autumnal Equinox, and it occurs because Earth spins on a tilted axis. Without that tilted axis, we wouldn't have different seasons.
3. The word equinox comes from two Latin words meaning "equal night." And most places on Earth will see the same amount of daylight and night tomorrow, 12 hours of each.
4. In the Northern Hemisphere, our daylight hours will get shorter every day until the Winter Solstice, which happens on Friday, December 21st this year. And the days will suddenly seem really short once Daylight Saving Time ends on November 4th.
5. You can call it fall or autumn. Both are correct, but the word autumn has been around longer.
(Travel & Leisure / Reader's Digest / Vox / Wikipedia)