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Puck
The Texan
Joined: 05 Jan 2004
Posts: 5596
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 Wed Dec 29, 2004 4:29 pm Scientists: Quake may have made Earth wobble |
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Scientists: Quake may have made Earth wobble
LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- The deadly Asian earthquake may have permanently accelerated the Earth's rotation, shortening days by a fraction of a second and caused the planet to wobble on its axis, U.S. scientists said Tuesday.
Richard Gross, a geophysicist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, theorized that a shift of mass toward the Earth's center during the quake Sunday caused the planet to spin 3 microseconds, or millionths of a second, faster and to tilt about an inch on its axis.
When one huge tectonic plate beneath the Indian Ocean was forced below the edge of another "it had the effect of making the Earth more compact and spinning faster," Gross said.
Gross said changes predicted by his model probably are too minuscule to be detected by a global positioning satellite network that routinely measures changes in Earth's spin, but said the data may reveal a slight wobble.
The Earth's poles travel a circular path that normally varies by about 33 feet , so an added wobble of an inch is unlikely to cause long-term effects, he said.
"That continual motion is just used to changing," Gross said. "The rotation is not actually that precise. The Earth does slow down and change its rate of rotation."
When those tiny variations accumulate, planetary scientists must add a "leap second" to the end of a year, something that has not been done in many years, Gross said.
Scientists have long theorized that changes on the Earth's surface such as tide and groundwater shifts and weather could affect its spin but they have not had precise measurements to prove it, Caltech seismologist Hiroo Kanamori said.
"Even for a very large event, the effect is very small," Kanamori said. "It's very difficult to change the rotation rate substantially."
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Republican_Man
STV's Premier Conservative
Joined: 26 Mar 2004
Posts: 14823
Location: Classified
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| Wed Dec 29, 2004 4:50 pm |
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Wow, fascinating. I wonder if it IS true and what impact it could have on us.
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"Rights are only as good as the willingness of some to exercise responsibility for those rights- Fmr. Colorado Senate Pres. John Andrews
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Hitchhiker
Rear Admiral
Joined: 11 Aug 2004
Posts: 3514
Location: Ontario, Canada
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| Wed Dec 29, 2004 6:07 pm |
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Not that much . . . the Earth is wobbling all the time. The only net difference is that in the very end it may delay the Earth's inevitable cessation of rotation, since the Earth slows down by a fraction of a second every day (I cannot remember the exact figure).
The earthquake and resulting tsunami are the things we should be worrying about 
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Link, the Hero of Time
Vice Admiral
Joined: 15 Sep 2001
Posts: 5581
Location: Kokori Forest, Hyrule
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| Wed Dec 29, 2004 10:59 pm |
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adding "Leap seconds" to the end of the year....
so we'll be sitting there going "5... 4... 3... 3... 3... 3... 2... 1" Like those TiVo comercials.
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Republican_Man
STV's Premier Conservative
Joined: 26 Mar 2004
Posts: 14823
Location: Classified
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| Wed Dec 29, 2004 11:03 pm |
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| Link, the Hero of Time wrote: | adding "Leap seconds" to the end of the year....
so we'll be sitting there going "5... 4... 3... 3... 3... 3... 2... 1" Like those TiVo comercials.
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lol
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"Rights are only as good as the willingness of some to exercise responsibility for those rights- Fmr. Colorado Senate Pres. John Andrews
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Beta6
Commander
Joined: 02 Jan 2005
Posts: 475
Location: ~*City Of Angels*~
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| Tue Jan 04, 2005 9:24 pm |
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good stuff
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D_Star
Lieutenant
Joined: 09 Oct 2004
Posts: 151
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| Tue Jan 04, 2005 9:35 pm |
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It is actually only affected by 2 microseconds. ...thats MICRO seconds not milleseconds.
Very very tiny amount of time.
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