Spring forward: Daylight-saving time starts Sunday

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Jeremy Larlee
  • AFNEWS
SAN ANTONIO (AFNEWS) --  Setting clocks forward an hour early for daylight-saving time is coming up quicker this year. The start of daylight-saving time, or DST, has been moved up from the first Sunday in April to the second Sunday in March.

On March 11, those living in areas under DST will set clocks forward one hour, from 2 to 3 a.m. People in Hawaii and most of Arizona do not practice daylight-saving time.

The theory behind DST is that resources are saved by shifting an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening. Thus, way less electricity is used.

The roots of DST stretch back to World War I when the German government established it in 1916. It was first used in the United States in 1918 but was repealed one year later. The practice was put back into use during World War II, but its use varied among states and localities. During the energy crisis in the 1970s, the start time of DST was moved up to as early as the first Sunday in January in 1974 and the last Sunday of February the following two years, before being shifted to the last Sunday in April. In 1987 a law was put in effect that changed the start of DST to the first Sunday in April which was the policy through last year. 

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