Scientists from the University of Vienna and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich indicate that the slowing of the Earth's rotation at a record pace is alarming.
A report from Science Focus magazine indicates that the rate at which Earth's days are increasing in length is unprecedented in the geological history spanning 3.6 million years.
The researchers reached this conclusion by analyzing the fossilized shells of ancient single-celled marine organisms that lived on the ocean floor, using their chemical composition to estimate sea level fluctuations in ancient times, and then inferring changes in the Earth's rotation rate.
Scientists attribute this record slowdown to the melting of polar ice caps due to climate change. Melted water flows from higher latitudes toward the oceans and is redistributed near the equator, shifting mass away from the poles and altering the Earth's rotation speed. According to researchers, the length of the day is currently increasing by approximately 1.33 milliseconds per century.
Professor Benedict Soja says that this change would require the redistribution of a massive mass of about 1,000 gigatons, noting that this could be imagined as an ice cube up to 10 kilometers high, higher than the summit of Everest.
Researcher Mostafa Kiani Shahvandi warns that this change in day length could affect the accuracy of space navigation systems within the solar system, as well as the Global Positioning System (GPS) on Earth.
