The shortest daylight in Russia will last 17.5 minutes.

In Russia and other countries of the Northern Hemisphere, on Sunday, December 21, daylight hours will be minimal due to the onset of the winter solstice. This was announced on December 20 by Sergey Yazev, a senior researcher at the Institute of Solar–Terrestrial Physics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Professor at Irkutsk State University (IGU).

"The light day in the Polar Dawns on December 21 will be the shortest in Russia. Its duration will be 18 minutes. The longest day duration during the winter solstice will be in the southernmost city of Russia, Derbent, Dagestan. It will be 9 hours and 7 minutes," he said in an interview with TASS.

Yazev specified that in Moscow, the duration of the day on December 21 will be 7 hours, and the night will last 17 hours. From December 22, the light part of the day will gradually increase.

According to the physicist, at the latitude of the Arctic Circle on this day, the Sun will be only a few minutes above the horizon. In places with an uneven horizon, for example, in mountainous areas, you may not see the Sun at all.

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On December 17, the press service of the Moscow Planetarium told about the winter solstice in the capital. It was specified that the moment of the winter solstice, when the Sun will be at the minimum height above the horizon, will come at 18:03 Moscow time.

All important news is on the Izvestia channel in the MAX messenger.