On page 248 I ask, "Does all this tectonic activity suggest that the plates are moving back together? And the earth wobbling, will it be put upright again?"
MSNBC: updated 9:11 a.m. CT, Tues., March. 2, 2010
The massive 8.8 earthquake that struck Chile may have changed the entire Earth's rotation and shortened the length of days on our planet, a NASA scientist said Monday.
"Perhaps more impressive is how much the quake shifted Earth's axis," NASA officials said in a Monday update.
The Chile earthquake was much smaller than the Sumatran temblor, but its effects on the Earth are larger because of its location. Its epicenter was located in the Earth's mid-latitudes rather than near the equator like the Sumatran event.
The fault responsible for the 2010 Chile quake also slices through Earth at a steeper angle than the Sumatran quake's fault, NASA scientists said.
"This makes the Chile fault more effective in moving Earth's mass vertically and hence more effective in shifting Earth's figure axis," NASA officials said.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35662192/ns/technology_and_science-space/
