Celebrate Summer Solstice In Framingham With These Events

FRAMINGHAM, MA — We’ve been enjoying summertime events in Framingham since before the start of meteorological summer on June 1, but the season officially gets underway Thursday, June 20, with the summer solstice.

Some ways to celebrate the summer solstice in our area include:

• Flowerpot Music Concert — Cotuit
• Summer Solstice Music Festival — Westport
• Summer Solstice Celebration 2024: Night at the Harvard Museums of Science & Culture — Cambridge
• Make Music Boston Summer Solstice Festival — Boston
• The Trustees Solstice Events — Various Locations

The sun travels its longest path through the sky on the day of the summer solstice, which occurs the exact moment it reaches its highest and northernmost points in the sky. It is the longest day of the year in terms of daylight. In Massachusetts, that’s at 4:50 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.

On Thursday, the sun will rise at 5:07 a.m. in the Boston area and will set at 8:24 p.m., meaning we’ll see about 15 hours and 17 minutes of daylight.

You can read more about the science of the summer solstice on The Old Farmer’s Almanac website.

The summer solstice offers a short window to see electric blue noctilucent clouds, the highest in Earth's atmosphere, which float about 50 miles above our planet's surface near the edge of space, which starts at an altitude of 62 miles.

This year, the solstice coincides with the full strawberry moon on June 21. It doesn’t happen often that the solstice falls within a day of the full moon — only about once every 19 to 20 years, according to Space.com.

As you’re filling out your summer calendar, block out a few dates for the summer meteor showers. The Delta Aquariids, Alpha Capricornids and the always-anticipated Perseids all start in July.

Read More

• 2024 Guide To Meteor Showers And Other Celestial Events

And, who knows, you may get a chance to see the aurora borealis, or northern lights, as the sun’s 11-year magnetic cycle goes into overdrive as it approaches what’s known as “solar maximum.” During this time, the sun’s magnetic field completely flips between the north and south poles. As the magnetic fields become tangled about midway through the cycle, the number of sunspots, where geomagnetic storms originate, is expected to ramp up.

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• More Chances To See Northern Lights Predicted In June
• Aurora Borealis Hunting Tips: What’s A Kp Index?
• ‘Internet Apocalypse’ Could Accompany Vivid Aurora