Ask A Scientist General Science Archive

Question:
What time zone is Antarctica in? Do they have daylight savings time?
 alice e packard

Answer 1:
I don't know about anybody else, but I found this question to be
both amusing and thought-provoking.  I asked a scientist friend
who has spent some time in Antarctica: the continent has no official
time zones.  Individual research stations use whatever time zone is
convenient, usually whichever is closest in S. America or Australia.
For example, McMurdo Station uses the same time zone as Christchurch,
New Zealand.  Dates and times are almost always expressed in GMT,
Greenwich Mean Time, as used by scientists all over the world to
avoid any possible ambiguity.
 jade hawk

Answer 2:  It is also interesting to note that most of
Antarctica lies south of the Antarctic circle, which means
that there is sunlight 24 hours a day during summer and
darkness 24 hours a day during winter.  Under these conditions,
I think you can see that there would be no point to having
daylight savings time.
-Grant