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Tue 30 Nov, 2004 05:41 pm
I posted this in the TV forum, but thinking about it I may have more luck here.
I watch american show JAG, anyone who has seen it will know that when it shows the time of day during the program, the time is given as, for example, Zulu 14.30 hours.
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The world is divided into 24 time zones. For easy reference in communications, a letter of the alphabet has been assigned to each time zone. The "clock" at Greenwich, England is used as the standard clock for international reference of time in communications, military, aviation, maritime and other activities that cross time zones. The letter designator for this clock is Z.
Times written in military time (24 hour format) are four digits, such as, 1830Z (6:30 pm) with the Zulu suffix. Note that the phonetic alphabet is used for the letter Z (Zulu). This time is usually referred to as Zulu Time because of the letter assigned to this time zone.
So my question is this, why on JAG (which is set in Virginia) is the time always given in Greenwich meantime terms?
If I understand the question, the importance of Greenwich mean time is it's use in navigation. There was a book, and accompanying series, called 'Longitude' which might explain the naval fixation with GMT.
The only way to determine longitude was to know the time in Greenwich where ever you were when you took readings on the position of the sun. (ie local time was irrelevant - largely because you didn't know where 'local' was).
hingehead wrote:If I understand the question, the importance of Greenwich mean time is it's use in navigation.
Agreed, but this is a story about lawyers, if they are in a courtroom in Virginia trying a case at 0900 hours on a wet wednesday in March, why would the time be given as 1400 Zulu?
It may make perfect sense but if it does I dont see it
Do we have any ex navy people here?
Maybe it does make a sort of sense, especially in this day and age. I imagine that in an era of high speed communications 'absolute' time is very important. You know, in those cases when it's about who knew what when...
or maybe I'm just whistling in the wind.
JAG? Haven't seen the show, but sound's like the Army's Adjutant General Corps. If so, the military frequently uses Zulu time - except the Marine Corps, of course, which would express 0900 hrs as "The little hand is on 6, and the big hand. . . "
LOL. Twice! If the little hand was on 6 it couldn't possibly be 0900.
From the halls of montezuma...
Maybe that's why I had to go into the Army instead
roger wrote:JAG? Haven't seen the show, but sound's like the Army's Adjutant General Corps. If so, the military frequently uses Zulu time - except the Marine Corps, of course, which would express 0900 hrs as "The little hand is on 6, and the big hand. . . "
roger, jag stands for
Judge
Advocate
General It's the USA navy legal dept.
As far as I know, most navies use as official time Zulu-time.
(Which during my time with Germany's biggest cruise agency usually led either to the question "Zulu or Alpha?" [10%] or persons being one hour too late or too early [90%] :wink: )
Btw: beside the world's navies, Zulu-time is the reference time for aviation as well (e.g. satellite passing times are in Zulu).
henrythe8 wrote:It may make perfect sense but if it does I dont see it
No conversions are necessary, everone knows exactly when what happens.
Exactly. Forget the Marine Corps, Walter is right.
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