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Upsurge in Big Earthquakes Predicted for 2018 (theguardian.com)

hcs_$reboot writes: "Scientists say the number of severe quakes is likely to rise strongly next year because of a periodic slowing of the Earth's rotation," reports the Guardian. "They believe variations in the speed of Earth's rotation could trigger intense seismic activity, particularly in heavily populated tropical regions. Although such fluctuations in rotation are small -- changing the length of the day by a millisecond -- they could still be implicated in the release of vast amounts of underground energy, it is argued."

The theory goes that the slowdown creates a shift in the shape of the Earth's solid iron and nickel "inner core" which, in turn, impacts the liquid outer core on which the tectonic plates that form the Earth's crust rest. The impact is greater on the tectonic plates near some of the Earth's most populous regions along the Equator, home to about a billion people. Scientists from the University of Colorado looked at all earthquakes registering 7 and up on the Richter scale since the turn of the 20th century. In this timeframe, the researchers discovered five periods of significantly greater seismic activity.

The seismic activity follows a five-year period of slowing in the earth's rotatio, and "This link is particularly important because Earth's rotation began one of its periodic slowdowns more than four years ago," according to the article.

"The Earth is offering us a five-year heads-up on future earthquakes," says one of the researchers, adding "The inference is clear. Next year we should see a significant increase in numbers of severe earthquakes."

16 of 88 comments (clear)

  1. #MAGMA by PopeRatzo · · Score: 4, Funny

    "Scientists say the number of severe quakes is likely to rise strongly next year because of a periodic slowing of the Earth's rotation,"

    Thanks a lot, Trump.

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  2. Re:Uhmm.... since when do.... by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Nope. Please read TFS for once (which has been nicely edited compared to my initial version!)

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  3. Re: Sound like more Global Warmingâï non by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Your parent clearly believes this is Fake Science. He wants to know who funded this study because he wants to identity the sinister globalists, anarcho-feminists, crypto-Marxists, SJWs, eco-terrorists or, I don't know... hipsters. Or something.

  4. I Blame the Joggers by HtR · · Score: 5, Funny

    This earth rotation issue was never a problem back when I was a kid. I blame the rise in jogging, specifically those joggers who jog eastward. If the joggers would just get together and only jog westward, the problem would be solved!

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    1. Re:I Blame the Joggers by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 4, Informative

      You're joking, but it's a cycle, which reason is not fully understood yet. Earth deceleration is about 1.7 ms a century. That made the recent negative acceleration 15 times 'faster' than usual.

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    2. Re:I Blame the Joggers by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      That made the recent negative acceleration 15 times 'faster' than usual.

      It could be Three Gorges Dam filling up, moving 40 billion tonnes of water 200m further from the earth's center.

  5. Re:Documentary about this by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 3, Informative

    Remove the `combined/`. Anyway that catastrophe movie seems to be a catastrophe.

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  6. The Charlatan Effect. by Templer421 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Just say crap and if it happens you can claim to be "Right."

    If it doesn't people tend to forget.

    No downside either you are either a genius or people forget what you said.

    1. Re:The Charlatan Effect. by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Informative

      I call this the Head Up Arse Effect. While scepticism is generally a good thing, we long ago reached the point where some people dismiss all science out of hand.

      Obviously since you posted such a detailed rebuttal of their claims this doesn't apply to you. I look forward to your paper refuting these jokers'.

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  7. Three Gorges Dam filling up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Did you do the calculations for that ?

    At least NASA has done those, according to Business Insider.

    Effect from the dam filling to the rotation time seems to be just 0,06 microseconds.

    1. Re:Three Gorges Dam filling up by rmdingler · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Did you do the calculations for that ?

      At least NASA has done those, according to Business Insider.

      Effect from the dam filling to the rotation time seems to be just 0,06 microseconds.

      We've long suspected that dams could do this, simply because when you shift the weight of the water around the globe, it affects the way the globe spins on its axis. It's the same as how a figure skater can spin faster by holding her arms above her head.

      Natural variations in the earth's rotation occur regularly, due to ice melt patterns and such, but it would be ill-advised to discount anthropogenic additions to a poorly understood planet-wide ecosystem. Only a planet dominated by a species that was science-challenged would make that mistake.

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  8. Mantle stickiness a factor by mattr · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is the kind of prediction you don't really want to be correct about. Would have liked to see some more technical explanation, but from a little googling I see there is a 32 year cycle of slowing which the scientists think might be due to mantle and crust sticking together more, which would also mess up the magnetic field a bit. I had no idea this was a thing. There are various other causes according to wikipedia apparently such as the Indian ocean earthquake which redistributed mass. So I wonder whether there would be any impact from water that melts from arctic ice. People living at the intersection of tectonic plates tend to think about this stuff.
    Two links: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
    https://qz.com/1133304/as-eart...

    1. Re:Mantle stickiness a factor by tquasar · · Score: 2

      Quakes are common, happen all the time. I live in south California and the last quake I felt was many years ago. There are quakes that cause a lot of damage but many are in areas with low population or where the damage isn't reported. https://earthquake.usgs.gov/ea...

  9. Re: Uhmm.... since when do.... by Aighearach · · Score: 3, Funny

    Since a long time ago, Jr.

    Since a long time ago.

  10. Re:Surprised they don't blame global warming by PoopJuggler · · Score: 2

    Algore, and the thousands of climatologists that actually went to college, understand the science, and study that shit. But I'm sure you right-wing deniers who slept at a Holiday Inn know better...

  11. Re:Oh Great... by deviated_prevert · · Score: 2

    Great. I can expect next year to be filled with "Global Warming Causes Earthquakes!" stories. Yay.

    Here is one just to piss you off. As the loss of Greenland Ice cap accelerates in speed due to global warming and many millions of tonnes of ice quickly calve off into the Greenland Sea the reduction in weight of the ice cap over the land will result in upthrust and very large earth quakes and perhaps volcanoes where there have been few and few are known to exist. The same also applies to the continent of Antarctica as it loses the ice cap. So yes natural and man made global warming can cause seismic events in the long term it already has in recent history. As the ice cap melted off the top of North America the upthrust of the center of the continent did cause earth quakes and is still causing them to a less extent to this day.A sudden upthrust event in Greenland caused by the rapid loss of the ice cap may not happen soon but upthrust will occur and is scientifically predictable in the same way that other huge events like a Maunder Minimum of the sun are predictable.

    Farting huge quantities of gas and liquids into shale rock to bring up oil and gas also is know to cause local earth quakes but again we have those, particularly in offices who deny that this is what is happening. I am sure that they will also point to this paper and say it was the slowing of the earth that is causing the recent earth quakes around their oil and gas fields. The misuse of the information gleamed by scientists is nothing new, the shills working as scientists for the petro chemical industry, the tobacco industry, the farm chemical industry have been doing it for years and are quite effective in creating lies. I ask you this if man made global warming is a huge scientific lie why is the evidence of this occurance proving to be irrefutable? And more importantly what would the scientist stand to gain from faking or fudging the related climate and atmospheric data they are all seeing? Paid scientists have been known to fake and hide data regarding tobacco usage, pesticides and many other commercially golden man made products that have killed millions. Show me which industry with a vested interest in man made global warming or Geo-science is sponsoring these flawed findings or just STFU

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