The massive earthquake that struck Japan last Friday was so powerful that it accelerated the Earth's rotation speed, shortening the length of the day by 1.8 microseconds, a new analysis by NASA has claimed.
According to scientists at the US space agency, the 8.9-magnitude quake shifted the way the Earth's mass is distributed, which made the planet spin a little faster, cutting the 24-hour day by an estimated 1.8 microseconds. That is less than two millionths of one second.
The initial data suggested that the quake moved Japan's main island about eight feet and shifted the Earth's figure axis, around which the Earth's mass is balanced, by about 17 centimetres, said Richard Gross, a geophysicist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
Earlier, scientists have estimated that the quake has shortened the day by 1.6 microseconds.
IndianExpress.com
March 15, 2011
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