The Observer

Universal Time

    Universal Time or U.T. or UTC or Greenwich Mean Time is all the same thing, essentially. It is the type of time kept by astronomers around the world so that there should be no confusion when going from time zone to time zone. If you live to the west of Greenwich England, your zone time is so many hours earlier than U.T. Those who are to the east of Greenwich have local times which are later than U.T. How much earlier or later? Well, that depends on where you are exactly. People who are in the Eastern Time zone of the United States should subtract five hours, (four hours if you are on Daylight Savings Time), from Universal Time to get your local time. For instance, 23:00 UT = 18:00 EST. Use it enough and you will get used to it.

The U.S. Naval Observatory can tell you more about Universal Time.

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