Washington.- Phil, the famous groundhog from Punxsutawney, in Pennsylvania, “predicted” this Thursday six more weeks of winter in the United States.
One more year Punxsutawney celebrated its traditional Groundhog Day, which is followed throughout the country and to which thousands of people come to learn Phil’s “prediction”: If when the groundhog sees its shadow when it comes out of its lair, there will be six more weeks of winter in the country. If not, spring will come earlier.
The rural area of Gobbler’s Knob, Phil’s “home”, is the place where this festive ceremony is held, which begins at night and concludes at dawn, when those in charge of the groundhog club, dressed in their gala suits, and top hats, arrive to “talk” with the animal and learn its prediction.
Despite the wishes of the public, who were clearly asking for an early spring, Phil’s keepers took the groundhog out of its den, showed it off, and left it on the pulpit from which they made their prediction: Six more weeks of winter.
The first recorded Groundhog Day ceremony in Punxsutawney took place in 1887, although it is believed that the tradition began many years earlier, with the arrival of Dutch immigrants to the area.
Phil’s “prediction”, in any case, is not very accurate: According to statistics from recent years, the groundhog is only right 40% of the time.
