Newgrange winter solstice live-stream this weekend

Image: Dept of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government.

With the Winter Solstice coming over this weekend, the Sunrise from within the Neolithic passage tomb at Newgrange is again to be live-streamed by the Office of Public Works in partnership with the National Monuments Service, writes Brian Byrne.

The streaming can be viewed live each morning from 20-22 December on www.gov.ie/opw and www.heritageireland.ie.

Traditionally a small number of people, drawn by lottery, were able to view the event in the summer and winter, weather permitting, from inside the tomb. But the pandemic has made that impossible for the last two years. The live-streaming can bring the phenomenon in the 5,000-years-old monument to viewers all over the world.

Archaeological researchers use the event to measure and monitor the movement of the winter sunlight coming through the roof box into the passage and chamber to determine how the beam of dawn light interplays with the chamber moving towards Solstice and then past it. 

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