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Japan Earthquake May Have Shifted Earth's Axis

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the buy-a-new-clock dept.

Zothecula writes "Using a complex model to perform a theoretical calculation based on a US Geological Survey, Richard Gross of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has determined that by changing the distribution of the Earth's mass, the earthquake that devastated Japan last Friday should have sped up the Earth's rotation, resulting in a day that is about 1.8 microseconds (1.8 millionths of a second) shorter."

3 of 253 comments (clear)

  1. Shifting the axis? by Superdarion · · Score: 5, Informative

    Everytime I heard that the Earth's axis had been changed during the Chile earthquake, I figured it was the rotation axis. I thought it was a little far-fetched, but I wasn't one to argue with the data. However, it is NOT the rotational axis that was shifted and this article finally clarifies that. I read many others before (probably regurgitations of the real scientific paper) and they never said that.

    Apparently, the axis that shifted is that of mass, called the Figure Axis, meaning the axis of symmetry in the Earth's mass distribution. We're still rotating in the same direction (defined by an axis which is not the Figure one), though.

  2. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 4, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  3. Re:Effect on GPS by skylerweaver · · Score: 3, Informative

    BTW: GPS satellites are NOT in geo-synchronous orbit.