The astrogeodetic deflection ηastro from Eq. (2b) can beexpected to agree with its corresponding gravimetric valueηgrav only if the astronomical and geodetic origins of longitude are parallel planes. This condition is not guaranteed inprinciple (see also Tscherning 1986), but it can be tested atsurface points where gravimetric determinations of η havebeen made, and where astronomical and geodetic longitudesΛ and λ are both determined. The difference η = ηastro –ηgrav includes errors in the determination of the coordinates,as well as errors of commission and omission in the gravimetric deflection. For a meaningful test, these errors shouldbe small relative to the magnitude of any supposed misalignment of the longitude origin.A slightly different, but equivalent, approach follows fromEkman and Agren (2010), who “synthesized” astronomicalcoordinates per Eq. (4), and then compared values of Λgravto the historical astronomical longitudes (Λ). For fundamental observatories at Stockholm, København, and Greenwich,their results indicated differences between Λ and Λgrav of0.4, 0.9, and 0.2, respectively. Here, the authors extendedthis approach by correcting the conventional BIH coordinatesof astronomical stations before 1984 (1968 BIH System) forlocal deflection, and then comparing the corrected coordinates to their geodetic coordinates with respect to WGS 84.If the origin for longitude was the same both before and after1984, then the longitude residual Λ – Λgrav for each BIHoptical station should be small relative to the uncertainty ofits estimated deflection, ση·sec ϕ.Consideration was limited to optical stations that could beconfidently identified, and also contributed to the BIH determination of UT1 prior to BTS 84 (Table 1). Where geodeticcoordinates were unavailable, the authors resorted to satellite imagery available via virtual globe services (e.g., GoogleEarth™, Bing™ Maps, etc.) to approximate the geodetic longitude of extant shelters or their ruins. For stations that were co-located with geodetic observatories, the precise ITRFcoordinates of nearby GPS or SLR stations confirmed thatgeolocation errors of the virtual globes were at the level of afew meters, which is generally below the uncertainty in ηgravfor EGM2008. In most cases, affiliated personnel providedcorroboration of extant structures, or geodetic coordinateestimates based on historic local surveys or GPS readings;this was the only means of positioning some long-demolishedstations.For the analysis, astronomical longitudes were adoptedfrom BIH annual reports between 1968 and 1983, except thatof Washington (W), which was adopted from Hughes et al.(1975). Small annual and semi-annual coordinate correctionsestimated by BIH, which could have been due to a combination of systematic errors (errors in catalogued star positions,instrumentation, and/or adopted longitude), were ignored.The final computation of ηgrav used station elevations interpolated from the ERTM2160 data set1 (Hirt et al. 2014),and included the ERTM2160 component of η to reduce theEGM2008 omission errors. However, neglecting the effectof elevation, and the effect of ERTM2160 on η, does notappreciably change the overall statistics, as only a few stations greatly exceed the average elevation of approximately200 m, or experience highly variable terrain.For all BIH stations investigated, the longitude differencesΛ – Λgrav were found to be within ±3 σ of the EGM2008commission error estimate (Table 1). The weighted average of Λ – Λgrav was statistically no different than zero(0.06 ± 0.14 1 σ), the weights being the reciprocal values of the EGM2008-implied commission error variances ofηgrav sec ϕ. Both results support the current placement of zerolongitude as being due to the local deflection of the verticalat Greenwich, with no change in orientation occurring at thetime of changeover to the BTS 84.