Tokyo, 20 January, /AJMEDIA/
Time is running out for the leap second. In 2022, metrologists voted to abandon the timekeeping quirk by 2035. Unlike the leap year, which occurs every four years, the leap second is deployed whenever clocks need adjusting due to variations in Earth’s spin causing slight changes in the length of a day. Global officials have inserted a leap second 27 times since 1972. But satellites and other tech that rely on the precise time kept by atomic clocks can glitch when the clocks are adjusted (SN: 4/22/06, p. 248). Scientists have suggested using a leap minute instead, which would require atomic clocks be reset once every 50 years or so.
