Eastern time zune

The Eastern Time Zone (ET or NAEST: North American Eastern Standard Time) of the Western Hemisphere falls mostly along the east coast of North America and the west coast of South America. Its time offset is −5 hrs GMT or UTC−5 during standard time and UTC−4 during daylight saving time. The clock time in this zone is based on the mean solar time of the 75th meridian west of the Greenwich Observatory.

In the United States and Canada, this time zone is generally called Eastern Time (ET). Specifically, it is Eastern Standard Time (EST) when observing standard time (winter), and Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) when observing daylight saving time (summer). The 1966 Uniform Time Act in the USA meant that EDT was instituted on the last Sunday in April, starting in 1966, throughout most of the USA.[1] EST would be re-instituted on the last Sunday in October. The act was amended to make the first Sunday in April the beginning of EDT as of 1987.[1] The Energy Policy Act of 2005 extended daylight saving time in the U.S. beginning in 2007. The local time changes at 02:00 EST to 03:00 EDT on the second Sunday in March and returns at 02:00 EDT to 01:00 EST on the first Sunday in November[1]. In Canada, the time changes as it does in the U.S.[2]

Contents [hide]
1 Usage
1.1 North America
1.1.1 Canada
1.1.2 United States
1.1.3 Mexico
1.1.4 Central America
1.1.5 Caribbean
1.2 South America
2 Major metropolitan areas
3 See also
4 Sources
5 References

[edit] Usage
[edit] North America

North American Eastern Time Zone (shown in the furthest right yellow)[edit] Canada
Main article: Time in Canada
In Canada, the following provinces and territories are part of the Eastern Time Zone:

Ontario (excluding areas west of Thunder Bay but including Atikokan)
Quebec (excluding far eastern Côte-Nord and the Magdalen Islands)
East-central Nunavut (including part of Melville Peninsula and most of Ellesmere and Baffin Islands, including Iqaluit; Southampton Island does not observe DST)
[edit] United States
Main article: Time in the United States
In the United States, 17 states and the District of Columbia are entirely located within the Eastern Time zone, while another six are split between the Eastern and Central time zones.

These states and Washington, D.C. observe only Eastern Time:

Connecticut
Delaware
Washington, D.C.
Georgia
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina
Ohio
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Vermont
Virginia
West Virginia


The exact specification for the location of time zones and the dividing line between zones is set forth in the Code of Federal Regulations at 49 CFR 71.[3]

These six states are split between Eastern and Central time:

Alabama: The entire state is officially in the Central Time Zone. However, a handful of communities unofficially observe Eastern Time because they are part of the Columbus, Georgia metropolitan area - Phenix City, Smiths Station, Lanett, and Valley.[4]
Florida: All of Florida is in the Eastern Time zone except for the portion of the Florida panhandle west of the Apalachicola River. As the Eastern-Central zone boundary approaches the Gulf of Mexico, it follows the Bay/Gulf county line.
Indiana: All of Indiana observes Eastern Time except for six northwestern counties in the Chicago metropolitan area and six southern counties in the Evansville metropolitan area.
Until 2006, the portions of Indiana within the Eastern Time Zone observed Eastern Standard Time year-round—except that five counties near Cincinnati and Louisville customarily observed Eastern Daylight Time despite legally being on Eastern Standard Time. See Time in Indiana.
Kentucky: Roughly, the eastern half of the state, including all of metropolitan Louisville is in the Eastern Time Zone and the western half is in the Central Time Zone; however, the boundary is not a neat "north-south" line but runs northwest-southeast.
Michigan: All of Michigan observes Eastern Time except the four westernmost counties, in the Upper Peninsula along the border with Wisconsin, which observe Central Time - Gogebic, Iron, Dickinson, Menominee. Historically the entire state observed Central Time. When Daylight Saving Time was first introduced, the Lower Peninsula remained on DST after it formally ended, effectively re-aligning itself into the Eastern Time Zone. The Upper Peninsula continued to observe Central Time until 1972, when all but the four counties noted changed to Eastern Time.
Tennessee: The eastern third of Tennessee is in the Eastern Time Zone. The area is roughly but not entirely coextensive with the region formally known as "East Tennessee".