Intergovernmental organisation near Paris, with 69 member states, that maintains the International System of Units (SI) and coordinates UTC.
The General Conference on Weights and Measures voted in Versailles to end the leap second, with UTC going continuous on May 20, 2027. UTC may then drift up to 3,600 seconds from Earth's rotation before a leap hour is added.
Perspective Coverage
7 publishersReality
BIPM member states vote this week on ending the leap second, in a resolution that would take effect in May 2027. A yes vote lets UTC drift from Earth's rotation. CNN reported the change would touch systems that telecoms, power grids and computers rely on.
Reality
Physicists including Singapore's Murray Barrett report in Nature a lutetium-176 clock accurate to the 19th digit, 41% better than the prior record. The team pitches lutetium as cesium's successor in defining the second, where its tolerance of heat may count as much as the record.
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Stephan Schlamminger's team spent ten years measuring big G with part of the data scrambled so that nobody could tune the answer to an expectation. The unblinded value differs unexpectedly from another leading result.
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Member states vote outside Paris in October on ending the leap second years early, swapping a discontinuity engineers have at least practised for a realignment no system now running will ever meet.
Reality