Phew!
From the “good to know” category.
The Russian Strategic Rocket Forces assure us that the extra second being added to 2005 (leap second) is no problem:
28/12/2005 13:20 MOSOW, December 28 (RIA Novosti) – The extra second being added to 2005 to make up for the slowing down of the Earth’s rotation, will not affect the operation of the Russian Strategic Missile Force, its press office said Wednesday.
The New Year in Russia and throughout the world will be ushered in one second later.
Yevgeny Fedoseyev, the head of time service at Russia’s Sternberg Astronomical Institute, said scientists throughout the world would correct the time December 31 by adding one second to the end of the day.
“This will be a state correction across the world, including Russia,” Fedoseyev said.
For more about Russian nuclear forces, I highly recommend Pavel Podvig’s sensibly titled blog, Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces.
What’s troubling about this is that they felt the need to issue such a statement.
What is even more troubling is that the keepers of 40-50 nukes in Aviano and Ghedi Torre, the Italian military, probably don’t even know what a leap second is and hence feel nothing at all.