Did you know that the Earth's rotation has slowed down about 6 hours in the past 2,740 years?

 Did you know that the Earth's rotation has slowed down about 6 hours in the past 2,740 years?

High school geography probably taught you that the Earth spins on its axis as it revolves around the sun.

This is responsible for the pattern of day and night.

If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if the Earth stood still, stick around to find out.

The interaction between ocean tides and Earth's continents is the biggest factor in slowing Earth down, Morrison explains. As those landmasses get slammed by the seas, Earth loses some rotational momentum. But models considering only this phenomenon suggest that Earth's rotation should be slowing down more than observed, by about 2.3 milliseconds per day every century.

So other factors must be at work, the researchers say. One major influence is the slow rebound of crust that was weighed down by massive ice sheets during the last ice age that have since melted away. Whereas the crust is springing upward at high latitudes, at lower latitudes the planet is shrinking inward. Like an ice skater bringing her arms inward to spin faster, that overall shift of mass is speeding up Earth's rotation, Morrison says.

ADVERTISEMENT