The initial data suggests Friday's earthquake moved Japan's main island about 8 feet, according to Kenneth Hudnut of the U.S. Geological Survey. The earthquake also shifted Earth's figure axis by about 6 1/2 inches (17 centimeters), Gross added.
The 8.8-magnitude earthquake in Chile last year also sped up the planet's rotation and shortened the day by 1.26 microseconds. The 9.1 Sumatra earthquake in 2004 shortened the day by 6.8 microseconds.
The pole has shifted a few degrees here & there I remember reading they had to close an airport in Florida to adjust to it and also the earthquake in Japan caused a minor shift.
The continents did not break apart - land rose and some sank - it is all joined together under the sea.
Originally posted by stereologist
reply to post by artistpoet
The continents did not break apart - land rose and some sank - it is all joined together under the sea.
Although the land is joined together under the sea, the material under the sea is partly continental material, but also a very different material called oceanic crust. This material comes from spreading ridges. It is younger than most continental crust. It has a different composition.
Axial precession is the movement of the rotational axis of an astronomical body, whereby the axis slowly traces out a cone. In the case of Earth, this type of precession is also known as the precession of the equinoxes, lunisolar precession, or precession of the equator. Earth goes through one such complete precessional cycle in a period of approximately 26,000 years or 1° every 72 years, during which the positions of stars will slowly change in both equatorial coordinates and ecliptic longitude. Over this cycle, Earth's north axial pole moves from where it is now, within 1° of Polaris, in a circle around the ecliptic pole, with an angular radius of about 23.5 degrees.
... explained by Newtonian physics. Being an oblate spheroid, the Earth has a nonspherical shape, bulging outward at the equator. The gravitational tidal forces of the Moon and Sun apply torque to the equator, attempting to pull the equatorial bulge into the plane of the ecliptic, but instead causing it to precess.
Link
Originally posted by roadgravel
Might as well throw in this:
Axial precession is the movement of the rotational axis of an astronomical body, whereby the axis slowly traces out a cone. In the case of Earth, this type of precession is also known as the precession of the equinoxes, lunisolar precession, or precession of the equator. Earth goes through one such complete precessional cycle in a period of approximately 26,000 years or 1° every 72 years, during which the positions of stars will slowly change in both equatorial coordinates and ecliptic longitude. Over this cycle, Earth's north axial pole moves from where it is now, within 1° of Polaris, in a circle around the ecliptic pole, with an angular radius of about 23.5 degrees.
... explained by Newtonian physics. Being an oblate spheroid, the Earth has a nonspherical shape, bulging outward at the equator. The gravitational tidal forces of the Moon and Sun apply torque to the equator, attempting to pull the equatorial bulge into the plane of the ecliptic, but instead causing it to precess.
Link
Originally posted by stereologist
reply to post by artistpoet
Thuban was the pole star between 2000 and 4000BC.
en.wikipedia.org...
... the pending pole shift
You are nowhere near qualified to do that.
Originally posted by stereologist
reply to post by murkraz
Could you give us a brief synopsis of the video? Not everyone wants to sit through an hour of video.
