SEATTLE — It won't be until late January when we see the sun set past 5 p.m.
The sunset in Seattle on Nov. 4 is 4:50 p.m. It will next set past 5 p.m. on Jan. 27, 2020.
Our days will continue to get shorter until the winter solstice on Dec. 21, when we see just under 8.5 hours of daylight. On that day, the sunrise will occur at 7:54 a.m. and set at 4:20 p.m.
On Nov. 3, Washington residents turned their clocks back an hour, despite lawmakers approving permanent Daylight Saving Time last spring.
Washington eliminate standard time unless Congress gives approval. Federal law allows states to opt out of Daylight Saving Time, but it doesn’t allow states to do the opposite. Hawaii and Arizona both operate on standard time year-round.
If Washington were to move to Daylight Saving Time year-round, we would stay on the same time we currently observe from March through November. We would keep later sunsets in the summer, but the change would be more noticed in the winter months. On the Winter Solstice, the sun wouldn’t rise until 8:54 a.m., and it would set at 5:20 p.m.
Supporters of year-round Daylight Saving Time argue that switching clocks negatively impacts our health, and extra hours of daylight in the evenings would reduce deadly crashes and crime.
