Kaushik Patowary Jul 8, 2021 0 comments Some years seem longer than others, especially when you are passing through a bad phase in life such as being stuck at home because a pandemic is playing havoc around, but officially the longest year on record was 1972. It was longer than the average year by a whole two seconds. The two extra seconds were leap seconds added on June 30 and again on December 31 the same year. Photo: What are leap seconds? From time to time, leap seconds are added to clocks on Earth to accurately reflect the observed solar time. This is due to the fact that the Earth’s rotation around the axis and its revolution around the sun is imprecise and varies from year to year.