Vernal Equinox and Egg Balancing

Photo provided by: crazialchemist

Every year, on one particular day, you may witness a very strange spectacle: people kneeling on pavements, people at tables and desks and counters, all trying to balance an egg on its end.

It's the Vernal Equinox, the day of approximately equal darkness and light. And more importantly, the only day you can balance an egg on its end. Well, supposedly...perhaps this piece of information is too egg-centric for you. Let's start from the very beginning.

What's The Vernal Equinox?

We observe an interesting, astronomical event during our first day of spring and fall on Earth when the Sun crosses the celestial equator. When that happens, we experience night and day of about equal length. This phenomenon is called an equinox and it occurs twice a year.

The path the Sun follows a path called the ecliptic. The two points on the ecliptic that are the farthest away from the celestial equator are called solstices. During the Winter Solstice the Sun is at its farthest point below the equator (aphelion); from this point on the Sun follows an increasingly elevated path through the sky daily until it intersects the equator. This is called the Vernal (Spring) Equinox. On this day, the axis of the Earth is perpendicular to the Sun, causing the Sun's rays to hit directly onto the equator. On this day the Sun rises exactly in the east, journeys across the sky for 12 hours, and sets exactly in the west, giving us a day of equal day and night along the equator. The exact date for the Vernal Equinox varies year by year, but is usually on or around 20-21-22 of March. 

What do you mean...Egg-Balancing?

According to legend, an egg will only balance on its end on the Vernal Equinox - hence all the people trying to stand up their eggs. The origins of this legend can be traced to ancient China, where it was believed that the balancing of eggs is easily accomplished on 'Li Chun,' which is considered to be the Beginning of Spring.

Incidentally, it wasn't the Chinese who insisted that the Vernal Equinox was the only time of the year that you could perform this feat...it was the Americans. This dates back to 1945 when Life magazine published an article by Annalee Jacoby about a large number of people balancing eggs in the city of Chunking, China, and consequently introduced the Western world to the strange behaviour of eggs on the first day of spring or vernal equinox.

Almost 40 years later, Donna Henes, a self-proclaimed artist rallied about a hundred New Yorkers to balance eggs at the exact moment of the 1983 Vernal Equinox at 11.39am. A skeptical reporter returned to the spot with a carton of eggs two days later where, to his chagrin, he discovered that not a single one of his eggs would balance.

After gaining this knowledge, people started digging in their egg cartons and balancing them on each equinox, sharing their egg-balancing eggs-perience with friends and family. Gradually the fad became a tradition. Every year there is a special slot for it in the media, be it television, radio or the papers. It usually centers around climatological or astrological ramifications that on that one day the Earth, Sun-and-egg line up in such a way that it is possible for the balancing act. There may be classrooms of children trying to perform the feat. I'm not exact sure why it's an egg. But it is what it is when it comes to unscientific legends.

Does it Really Work?

Sure it does. You can balance an egg on its end on the Vernal Equinox. Just ask anybody who's ever tried.There are just many problems on trying to explain the pseudoscience behind this apparently miraculous event. According to legend, the gravitational force is at perfect levels only at the precise moment of the equinox of Earth in order to balance the egg on end.

Unfortunately, when you bring gravity into the picture, you are faced with several embarrassing problems, namely:

• Why are eggs the only balance-able objects on this particular day of the year?
• It doesn't put latitude into the equation. Will it be able to work at all of Earth's latitudes.
• While we're on latitudes - contrary to what we were taught in school, the Earth is not round. It's an ellipse. Therefore the gravity in different parts of the world will vary slightly around 9.8 meters per second squared at sea-level.
• Why isn't the moon involved? The Sun's gravitational pull may be strong enough to keep us in orbit, but the Moon should be involved.
• Why is it that the Sun only exerts this force on the Vernal Equinox? There's an Autumnal Equinox as well.

Basically...there should be nothing other than the outside elements from keeping you from this balancing-act on any other day.

Basics on the Very Real Science Behind Gravity

Gravity is among the four fundamental forces and it is indeed everywhere. It's in the coffee you're drinking, the room you are in and even on the computer screen you're currently and attentively looking at right now. At it's most basic principles...it's a force among objects and their interactions.

The force of gravity on Earth at sea level is approximately 9.8 meters per second squared and it decreases the further "up" you travel into the atmosphere. So if you decided to jump toward the sky from where you are...you will fall back towards Earth at a rate of 9.8 meters for every second sqaured.

It is also a force that relates to two or more bodies. The closer lets say TWO objects are from one another...the STRONGER the force of gravity will be between the two. The force of gravity will then decrease the further away the two object become from one another. This is essentially the reason as to why Earth orbits the sun...explained further by Newton's Universal Law of Gravitation and Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion.

Provided by: About.com

Try it

Go ahead - balance an egg. You'll need:

• One raw egg (or many, if you keep on smashing them)
• One flat surface

 Go and give it a shot...and happy spring!