Counting down to 2009
ha juz read an interesting news. New Year on hold: leap second makes time stand still. Eager to see the back end of 2008? Be forewarned: the world's official timekeeper has decided to prolong the year -- by one full second, to be precise. Which means a Champagne-soaked countdown to 2009 something like this: "...THREE, TWO, ONE-AND-A-HALF, ONE... Happy New Year!" The extra second was mandated by the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS) in Paris, and is not to be taken lightly. Satellites that orbit at speeds calculated in kilometres (miles) per second, the Internet, global positioning systems -- all depend on knowing exactly what time it is. IERS head Daniel Gambis announced the time-stretching measure in July in a letter addressed to "authorities responsible for the measurement and distribution of time". That would be the white-robed guardians of the 200-odd ultra-accurate atomic clocks scattered in national time temples around the...