Posted on 07/24/2025 2:56:39 PM PDT by Signalman
Two days this summer have been unusually short, with the shortest expected on Aug. 5, leading global timekeepers to consider adding a negative leap second.
The Earth's rotation has accelerated in recent decades, leading scientists to consider adding the first ever negative leap second.
Earth is spinning so fast that global timekeepers are considering something that's never been done before: adding a negative leap second.
So far this year, July 9 and July 22 have been unusually short — by about 1.3 and 1.4 milliseconds, respectively. However, Aug. 5 is expected to be even shorter, losing roughly 1.5 milliseconds, according to timeanddate.com.
This follows a trend that has been observed since 2020. "We now have slightly shorter days than in the last 50 years," Dirk Piester, head of Time Dissemination Group 4.42 at Germany's national meteorology institute, previously told Live Science.
Earth's energy imbalance is rising much faster than scientists expected — and now researchers worry they might lose the means to figure out why an abstract illustration of a clock with swirls of light Groundbreaking atomic clock is off by less than 1 second every 100 million years
Why is Earth spinning faster? A day on Earth lasts roughly 86,400 seconds, or 24 hours — the time it takes for the planet to fully rotate on its axis. But exactly how long it takes to perform one full rotation depends on many factors, including the positions of the sun and the moon, and Earth's gravitational field.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Anthropogenic planetary spin change!
Can we use this as an excuse if we’re pulled over for speeding?
Where is Mr Hand? Are you people on dope?
Installing speed brakes like putting solar panels? Big huge panels in the desert?
Oh crap, CERN musta dropped a micro black hole into the core and we’re beginning to speed up with contraction...
1.5 milliseconds. So short you couldn’t even blink your eyes that quick.
Hey these things build up....over millennia...
We have to stay absolutely accurate.
(Only half kidding.)
Silly "science." They were just complaining a few months ago, that the earth was spinning more slowly - and longer exposure to sunlight, was "global warming."
For years, they were telling us that it is getting slower.. which is it?
sigh... I still got egg on my face from that... the thing that got me the worst, is the fact that ABSOLUTELY NOTHING happened... not being as bad as expected would have been easier to handle. but the fact that nothing happened, lol... that was the kick....
Someone should tell Bill Gates this is reason for him to NOT block out the sun.
I stopped reading at deducting a second because of the 10 year time frame to lose that one second...
What a pantload.
Dang it. Is this why my internet connection has been a little slow the past couple of days?
I feel dizzy. I must sit down.
Correction, the name of the group is They Might Be Giants
Is AOC (aka “Sandy”) spinning on the bar top again?
I’m think we’re losing mass. All the satellites and rockets we’ve sent up in the last 60+ years, since the Soviets started with Sputnik.
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