Mysterious Shift in Earth's Gravity Suggests Equator is Bulging

space.com ^ | 1 Aug 02 | Robert Roy Britt

[SamAdams76]

Actually it's not the beer that gives you that pot belly. It's the food that goes with the beer that piles the weight on. (I'm in the same boat myself.) I don't know if I can eat less, there are so many foods that go well with beer!

[SamAdams76]

Actually it's not the beer that gives you that pot belly. It's the food that goes with the beer that piles the weight on. (I'm in the same boat myself.) I don't know if I can eat less, there are so many foods that go well with beer!

[r9etb]

As far as GPS is concerned, they have picked a limited selection of spheroids and insist you use them.

I'm talking more about the broadcast message and how it's built.

The message is constructed by a series of least squares fits over a long-term prediction of the satellite trajectory. If the gravity model is significantly flawed the prediction may be off by meters per day.

In real life, some of is mitigated by the operators, who keep an eye on the accuracy of the broadcast message; however, it increases workloads, and if there are any delays in sending new orbit information to the satellites, the world will see additional errors in their solution.

Not too big a deal for most, but probably rather upsetting for a GPS-guided bomb.

[RightWhale]

Try going to single portions.

[teletech]

Must be due to all those discarded half eaten Big Macs!

[mewzilla]

Who's the earth gonna sue for its bulging equator?

[mewzilla]

And is there a plus-size theory of plate tectonics?

[r9etb]

They will miss your bunker by 420.04 feet. Those who are typing in coordinates for Saddam's cubicle are probably going slowly mad with the constant and variable shifts in random directions as the earth's gravity field meanders.

Don't make unwarranted assumptions. Selective availability has been turned off, and the guided bombs never had to contend with it anyway. You can ask the cave-dwelling Talibunnies whether those bombs missed by 430 feet...

[decimon]

Capitalism is to blame. The exploitive nations of the northern hemisphere have stolen so much of the raw material from the equatorial zone that the reduction in surface mass is causing underlying layers to bulge towards the surface.

Or it could be the cell phones.

[RightWhale]

Each satellite in the GPS constellation has to be updated constantly. Whether it is every day I don't know, but if they start drifting the receivers will just follow. I assume they are updated every time there would be enough error to measure. For differential stations, that would be of the order of a foot.

[Straight Vermonter]

Resembles Gore, doesnt it?

Nah. No sweat rings.

[leadhead]

The polar weight loss due to glacial melting has been offset by the gradual move away from the equator of Hillary Clinton.

Couldn't agree more! The changed ocean flow isn't from washing old crusty.

[r9etb]

The satellites are updated whenever the error reaches a certain value, unless for some reason they cannot get an upload into the satellite. Standard is at least once a day, and often more.

[Mercat]

My law partners would say it's the fault of the evil Republicans.

[SamAdams76]

[RightWhale]

Tora Bora is practically equatorial. South of Europe and New York, anyway. Down there, the earth is rounder, or used to be until this article. There has always been a question of accuracy for over-the-Pole ICBM shots, too.

[Wingsofgold]

My Mama says it's cause hell has enlarged itself, quotes the Bible. :)

[RightWhale]

Extra ketchup, please.

[Centurion2000]

This report is pretty stupid. The idea that the glaciers and oceanic weight would affect the shape of the planet is pretty stupid. This would be like saying that the first layer of skin on an onion can affect the shape of the onion.

[cmsgop]