According to a shocking announcement from the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS), the Earth is currently rotating on its axis at a faster speed than at any other time in the past half-century, causing a day to no longer be exactly 24 hours.
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The Earth – Image: NASA
The shortest day recorded was on July 19, 2020, when a day was found to be missing 1.4602 seconds. The IERS has proposed adding a “negative leap second” each day to allow clocks to run more in line with the planet’s motion.
This is a completely surprising discovery, as reported by The Telegraph, since scientists previously had to add “leap seconds” to the time due to the Earth appearing to rotate slower than the 24-hour pace before 2020. Only in 2020 did it accelerate. The addition of negative leap seconds remains a subject of debate.
“It may be necessary to introduce a ‘leap second’ if the Earth’s rotation speed continues to increase, but it is too early to say if this is likely to happen,” stated Dr. Peter Whibberley, a researcher from the National Physical Laboratory in the United Kingdom, in an interview with The Telegraph.
While the rotational speed of a planet typically varies over its lifetime, it is important to consider factors that cause these changes in a short period of time.
The phenomenon of faster rotation was predicted in a study published in the scientific journal Science Advances in 2015, suggesting that global warming could accelerate the Earth’s rotation. As glaciers melt, the redistribution of mass shifts the planet’s movement, causing it to rotate faster on its axis.