One of shortest days on record expected this month as scientists warn Earth's rotation is ‘unexpectedly' speeding up
I'M SPINNING AROUND One of shortest days on record expected this month as scientists warn Earth's rotation is 'unexpectedly' speeding up
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EARTH is set to have three unexpectedly shorter than average days in the coming weeks - and it's taken scientists by surprise.
The first of the shorter days will take place next week.
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It's likely all thanks to the Moon, according to Popular Mechanics.
The dates fall when our lunar satellite will be its furthest from Earth's equator.
This can impact the rate of the Earth's rotation, which causes slight variations in the length of a day.
Although experts have not yet confirmed the cause of the change.
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The International Rotation and Reference Systems Service has found that 9 July, 22 July, and 5 August will be the shortest days since 2020.
As much as 1.51 milliseconds will be shaved off the clock, according to a experts.
While that doesn't seem like much, and won't be noticeable, scientists say it's a pretty significant time jump.
'Nobody expected this,' Leonic Zotov, Earth rotation expert from Moscow State University, told TimeandDate.com.
'The cause of this acceleration is not explained. Most scientists believe it is something inside the Earth.
"Ocean and atmospheric models don't explain this huge acceleration."
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The shortest day recorded since 2020 was 5 July, 2024, which was a full 1.66 milliseconds shorter than average.
Before 2020, Earth never experienced a day shorter than the average by much more than a millisecond.
But in the past five years, it's been more likely to see days during the summer that are nearly half-a-millisecond shorter than pre-2020s levels.
Days on Earth have not always been 24-hours long.
Between the dinosaur-dominated Mesozoic era and the Bronze Age, days were roughly only 23 hours.
Bronze Age people experienced days that were 0.47 seconds shorter than what humans in 2025 experience.
Projections suggest that in 200million years, a day will extend to 25 hours.
Earth may need to take a drastic measure to keep up with the new pace by introducing a 'negative leap second' in 2029, according to a study published in Nature last year.
'This is an unprecedented situation and a big deal,' study lead author and geophysicist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California Duncan Agnew said at the time.
'It's not a huge change in the Earth's rotation that's going to lead to some catastrophe or anything, but it is something notable.
"It's yet another indication that we're in a very unusual time.'
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Our solar system is made up of nine planets with Earth the third closest to the Sun. But each planet has its own quirks, so find out more about them all... How old is Earth? Plus other facts on our planet
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