What are the Odds?
by Lana Reinhart
February 26, 2008
The odds of being born on Leap Day are about 1 in 1500. If you were born on February 29, you share this date with approximately 187,000 people in the U.S. and about 4 million in the world!
But why do we need a leap year, you may ask? A leap year occurs every four years in order to help synchronize the calendar year with the solar year, or the length of time it takes the earth to complete its orbit around the sun (about 365 1/4 days). The length of the solar year, however, is slightly less than 365 1/4 days--by about 11 minutes. To compensate for this discrepancy, the leap year is omitted three times every four hundred years.
Most generally, a leap year occurs when the year can be divided evenly by 4. A century year, however, cannot be a leap year unless it is divisible by 400. Therefore, 1700, 1800, and 1900 were not leap years, but 1600, 2000, and 2400 are leap years.
HAPPY LEAP DAY ! ! !
