Wow. That’s a lot more than I thought. In my experience, even ORD is pretty dead after 10-11 pm.
Thanks for the correction.
Most of the airports with large 2300-0100 departure operations are not in the US Central time zone. The US west coast, SE Asia, and the Persian gulf hubs are real big at that time. Miami also launches a continuous blast of flights to South America starting at around 2130 and going full bore until about 0100.
There may well be other cities around the world where the combination of time zone differences and desired times of arrival at the major markets dictates a big push near midnight local from a hub or other gateway.
You’re certainly right that the number of domestic departures from O’Hare drops pretty steeply to zero after 10pm. And most of those are headed to the Pacific timezone to arrive at about midnight west coast time. That’s true of just about every hub or concentration point in the central time zone.
This claim surprises me. As far as I am aware, in normal conversation, people in non-English-speaking cultures say it’s 8 o’clock or arrange to meet at half past five just like we do in English, while only using the 24-hour clock for schedules and other “official” contexts.
I fly out of LAX to various US and international airports and often take redeyes. I can assure you that LAX is alive and kicking after midnight. I’ve flown redeyes on Delta, United, American, and Alaska. All you need to do is go on to Expedia or Kayak and you will see an abundance of flights that depart after midnight.
That is certainly the English traditon. Dawn is a new day. I think it changed when we switched to Railway Time.
Although I know it sounds like a contradiction, I’ve found people generally know what you’re talking about if you say you “stayed out all night Tuesday night” but had an accident “at 4am Wednesday morning.” Is anyone seriously confused about that?
And I worked the graveyard shift for years as a young buck and can’t recall ever having a confusing 2am conversation about whether you’re working “tomorrow night.” Sure, it was the night of the calendar day you’re on right now, but no one was confused. And this was West Texas, where stupid people abound.
Probably just me. Mentally I don’t consider today to have finished until I’m home in bed, even if that is at 7am. When someone asks if I’m working tonight I do a mental double take while I realise that their concept of tonight is different from mine. I think it is a coping mechanism to make the time available for sleeping seem longer.
Even with 24 hour time there is the problem of determining what day (12) midnight belongs to, and whether midnight is really 00:00:00. Take your pick though, as long as you have the time recorded consistently the designation rarely matters and the specific time is known.
I don’t see any reason why 00:00:00 should belong to the day prior or why 24:00:00 should belong to the next day. Seems clear enough to me.
Asking which day midnight belongs to is like asking whether zero is positive or negative.
Yes, the word “midnight” is ambiguous in this sense, but in the 24-hour system the convention is that 0:00 is the midnight that starts the calendar day, and 24:00 is the midnight that ends the day. So, Monday 24:00 = Tuesday 0:00.
ETA: originally directed at RP’s last post, but also relevant to the couple that just snuck in ahead of me.
Agree that 0000 / 2400 are perfectly clear whenA) the day or date are specified
AND
B) either 0000 or 2400 (but not both) are specified
AND
C) the word “midnight” is not used
AND
D) the audience is aware of the “midnight ambiguity” problem
AND
E) the audience is thinking about time specifically and technically, not colloquially or haphazardly.All of those things are reliably present for shift workers’ rosters in general and airline crew schedules in particular.
The last two are simply absent from the great bulk of consumers at large and airline passengers in particular. Which is why it’s a darn good idea not to use 0000 or 2400 in anything aimed at the public. At least not the US public; a benighted and pig-blind group if ever there was one.
All I know is if I need to list the time in an unambiguous notation I use 12:00N and 12:00M. Seems to work.
Well, the US public is not used to the 24-hour clock, so, no, I wouldn’t use that notation here. But I remember it being not unusual seeing 0:00 or 24:00 on train schedules or office hour times in parts of Europe, so people are able to figure it out.
12 noon= 12NN
12 Midnite= 12MN
I don’t following this logic. The reason that 0 is neither positive nor negative is by definition. We can just as reasonably define midnight to be the last point in time for a day before the next day starts. There does not have to be a point defined as a boundary point between two days.
At some point in time the boundary exists, correct?
Since time is linear, that means all possible times, rational and irrational, occur.
The boundary thus must occur at some point; you cannot have it occur at a time which is in between all possible times.
There is no “next” point/time after 12:00 (this is a property of real numbers).
Therefore, if we don’t designate 12:00 itself as the boundary, then ANY point thereafter that we try to designate as the boundary will result in an INFINITE number of times occurring between 12:00 and the boundary. That’s not exactly a great idea. :dubious:
You can define 12:00 midnight as the last point in time in a day. There is no reason, mathematical or otherwise, that point cannot be part of that day. It is not required to define a boundary point that belongs to neither day.
The inequality y <=2 defines an area such that if a point has y > 2 it is outside that area. Any point where y = 2 is part of that area. There is no requirement to define a point that is neither inside nor outside the area. There is no “next number” after 2 because no matter what number you name, there will always be another real number between 2 and that named number. But that doesn’t mean 2 can’t be part of the set.
Comparing midnight to the number 0 is a false analogy.
And which airports let them do it?