One O'Clock Gun

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The One O'Clock Gun , time signal from June 25, 2007
The historic cannon at Edinburgh Castle (1861)
The Birkenhead One O'Clock Gun

The One O'Clock Gun ( English for '13 o'clock cannon') is a historical time signal at Edinburgh Castle and is fired Monday through Saturday at precisely 1 p.m. local time. Another One O'Clock Gun is known in Birkenhead .

History of the One O'Clock Gun at Edinburgh Castle

The origin of this tradition lies in the time of the seafarers, when the sailing ships in the Firth of Forth needed an exact time setting to adjust their chronometers . In 1861, the Scottish officer Captain Wauchope invented the "so-called time ball " (time ball) , which can still be seen today at the Nelson Monument on Calton Hill. The falling of the ball signaled to the sailors that it was 1 p.m. However, someone had to look at the ball exactly at this point, otherwise the point in time was missed. That is why the cannon shot was introduced that same year, originally fired from an 18-pound muzzle-loading cannon on the Half Moon Battery. The crack of the shot can be heard up to 3.2 kilometers away. The muzzle-loading cannon was replaced by a modern 25-pound Howitzer in 1953 and then by an L118 light gun. She is currently standing on Mill's Mount Battery in the north of the castle and is being shot down by the District Gunner of the 105th Regiment Royal Artillery (Volunteers).

Although the cannon is actually no longer needed in the era of atomic clocks , firing the cannon is considered a tourist attraction and will therefore continue. The cannon was served the longest by District Gunner Staff Sergeant Thomas McKay (MBE, known as Tam the Gun) from 1979 until his death in 2005. He also opened a small museum about the cannon in the castle. From 2005 to 2012 this honorable task was fulfilled by Sergeant Jamie Shannon, known as "Shannon the Cannon". Since 2012, for the first time in her history, the position has been taken by a woman. The cannon is also fired once on New Years when the New Year arrives.

History of the One O'Clock Gun in Birkenhead

The von Birkenhead was fired at Morpeth Dock to give a time signal for the ships. It was operated until 1969 and since October 2015 a cannon has been fired again in this tradition.

Problem sonic transit time

With all acoustic markings there is the problem of the sound propagation time between the signal source and the observer. The speed of sound in dry air at 20 ° C is 343.2 m / s (1236 km / h). The signal is heard with a delay of one second at a distance of approx. 340 m. At a distance of approx. 1000 m (1 km) it is already about 3 seconds. This delay can be important for navigation when setting clocks. Optical markings (time ball) work without delay.

See also

Web links

Commons : Time cannons  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b One O'Clock Gun ( Memento of November 4, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) on the official website of Edinburgh Castle (English)
  2. ↑ The Time Ball and the 1'O Clock Gun ( Memento from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) at Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory (POL) (English)
  3. ↑ One o'clock gun is fired again by Fort Perch Rock in New Brighton ( Memento from November 4, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) near Liverpool Echo (English)

https://web.archive.org/web/20070927202715/http://www.pol.ac.uk/home/history/gun.html

Coordinates: 55 ° 56 '57.1 "  N , 3 ° 12' 3.4"  W.