Posted on 03/10/2014 5:17:56 AM PDT by InvisibleChurch
When the military is involved with fighting, is there a central time used to coordinate maneuvers or is the local time where the action is based used?
Yes.
My experience is 40+ years old, but time was always Zulu time, i.e., Greenwich.
Zulu time.
The Military uses a 24 hr clock....1Pm is 1300, 2 pm is 1400 etc. To coordinate operations Zulu time (Greenwich) will be used when operating between time zones.
Not in the military, but I’ve worked with them a lot in things that span timezones... What I’ve seen is that it depends. A time can be specified either as 0630Z or 0900L. Where the “Z” addendum means Zulu time (GMT) or the “L” means local - the local time at, well, whatever is taking place.
"Zulu" time is that which is more commonly know as "GMT" (Greenwich Mean Time) or time at the Zero Meridian.. Our natural concept of time is linked to the rotation of the earth and we define the length of the day as the 24 hours it takes (on average) the earth to spin once on its axis.
As time pieces became more accurate and communication became global, there needed to be a point from which all other world times were based. Since Great Britain was the world's foremost maritime power when the concept of latitude and longitude came to be, the starting point for designating longitude was the "prime meridian" which is zero degrees and runs through the Royal Greenwich Observatory, in Greenwich, England.
When the concept of time zones was introduced, the "starting" point for calculating the different time zones was agreed to be the Royal Greenwich Observatory.
Unfortunately the Earth does not rotate at exactly a constant rate. Due to various scientific reasons and increased accuracy in measuring the earth's rotation, a new timescale, called Universal Time Coordinated or Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), has been adopted and replaces the term GMT.
The Navy, as well as civil aviation, uses the letter "Z" (phonetically "Zulu") to refer to the time at the prime meridian.
NOAA satellites use Zulu Time or Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) as their time reference. The satellite images that appear on NOAA's Web sites are stamped in Zulu time.
The Department of the Navy serves as the United States official timekeeper, with the Master Clock facility at the U.S. Naval Observatory, Washington, D.C.
stupid question, i guess, then: I read the article you offered for Zulu Time: does that have anything to do with the Brits fighting the Zulus in Africa long ago?
A = Alpha
B = Bravo
C = Charlie
...
X = Xray
Y = Yankee
Z = Zulu
That’s all there is to it.
OK,Thanks. I appreciate it.
Zulu or GMT is commonly used by airline crews- so that all crews are on the same time even when they are based in or flying in different time zones.
Also- DDay usually means the Normandy invasion, but the term was used for the planned day of any large battle. The start time was HHour and that would be GMT- no matter where in the world it took place.
Now, on a practical basis, General Schwarzkopf while fighting/communicating in Iraq but communicating/fighting with the politicians in Washington on a very regular basis every day and coordinating multiple nations using multiple services across all times around the world, wore three watches.
One on Iraq time, because he had to know it.
One on a Zulu Greenwich (or worldwide) time.
One on Washington (East coast, US) time because few politicians are smart enough to know how to convert hours to anything but dollars and news events.
Greenwich time does NOT change with daylight savings time.
When we completed a weapons load it was always marked as Zulu Time.
Zulu time.
S2 always started their brief with current zulu time and which direction was general north.
Probably not related to your question, but an interesting tidbit from history...
My birth certificate has my time of birth stated as “War Time” - (born during WW2).
What that signifies is similar to DST, in that they changed the time for reasons related to the war effort - either to make black-outs easier, or for wartime production - not really sure about the last, and then to think it was black-outs.
that could be about the wartime. D-Day eas suppose to mean any invasion but, after normandy, it was referred to in the pacific s A-Day. Most of the time in the army we used local time but i have never heard L standing for local. for example it is 101434TMAR14 here in colorado (MST) or 102234ZMAR14.
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