[Northkeep] Fwd: Neptune's Birthday

[Kevinkeary]

For those as geeky as I am:
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Sent: Tue, Jul 12, 2011 6:06 am
Subject: Neptune's Birthday


Today July 12, 2011 is Neptune's first Birthday

The Planet Neptune was discovered in 1846 (165 Years ago) by Johann Gottfried Galle at the Berlin Observatory but since it takes Neptune 165 years to orbit the Sun it has done just 1 orbit around the Sun since then.   So it is 1 Neptunian Year since it was discovered. 
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For those even geekier, it was discovered on September 23, 1846, and its orbit is 60,190 days, 164.79 years.
 
165 years is 60,225 days plus 40 for the leap years (1900 was not a leap year) for 60,265 days. So, Neptune's birthday by this definition would fall 75 days earlier than September 23, or July 10. Whoever wrote this originally was close, but off by 2 days. My guess is they counted the leap years wrong.
 
Kevin