Earth’s Rotation Is Slowing Down Causing Days To Be Slightly Longer

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Earth’s Rotation Is Slowing Down Causing Days To Be Slightly Longer

December 13th, 2015

Awake Goy

Melting glaciers and natural global warming has been blamed by scientists for slowing down earth’s rotation on its axis.

The scientists say that the melting of glaciers caused by the world’s rising temperatures appears to be causing a slight slowing of the Earth’s rotation

Earth’s axis is also also wobbling in a motion called a ‘polar wonder’ due to melting ice and rising oceans according to research published in the journal Science Advances

The Mirror reports:

The driving force behind the modest but discernible changes in the Earth’s rotation measured by satellites and astronomical methods is a global sea level rise fueled by an influx of meltwater into the oceans from glaciers , the researchers said.

“Because glaciers are at high latitudes, when they melt they’re distribute water from these high latitudes towards lower latitudes, and like a figure skater who moves his or her arms away from their body, this acts to slow the rotation rate of the Earth,” Harvard University geophysicist Jerry Mitrovica said.

The movement of ice and meltwater is also causing a slight migration of the Earth’s axis, or north pole, in a phenomenon known as “polar wander,” the researchers said.

“Imagine that figure skater who doesn’t stick their arms straight out but rather sticks one at one angle and the other out at another angle. The figure skater will begin to wobble back and forth. This is the same thing as polar motion,” Mitrovica said.

The research looked at the changes in the planet’s rotation and axis in light of the world’s sea level rise in the 20th century as a result of increasing global temperatures.

The melting of the ice sheets and the rise in sea levels moved the planet’s rotation axis, or north pole, at rates of less than a centimeter per year, Mitrovica said.

This melting slowed the Earth’s rotation and increased the duration of a day by about a thousandth of a second over the 20th century, Mitrovica said.