快猫短视频

THE mischief-making El Ni帽o has struck again. 快猫短视频s reported last
week that the unusual wind patterns caused by this year鈥檚 strong El Ni帽o
have slowed the Earth鈥檚 rotation very slightly, making days drag on an extra 0.4
milliseconds.

El Ni帽o, which causes a reversal of ocean currents across the Pacific,
plays havoc with the world鈥檚 weather. Winds near the equator that usually blow
from east to west slow down, while westerly winds like the jet stream speed up.
The net effect is that the atmosphere spins around the Earth faster and faster
in the direction of the Earth鈥檚 rotation.

快猫短视频s expected that as the atmosphere speeds up, it would steal momentum
from the Earth, making the Earth spin slower and days longer. Now this effect
has been measured using the Very Long Baseline Interferometer (VLBI), an array
of more than 100 radio telescopes around the world.

This telescope array monitors the arrival times of signals from distant
quasars in the sky as the Earth rotates. By looking at the timing records, John
Gipson of NASA鈥檚 Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland and his colleagues were
able to measure variations in the length of day as small as five millionths of a
second.

Their results showed that since last summer, when a powerful El Ni帽o
began, the day has lengthened by 0.4 milliseconds. 鈥淭he changes in the Earth鈥檚
rotation really give us a research tool,鈥� says David Salstein, a meteorologist
at Atmospheric and Environmental Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 鈥淚t shows
the overall effect of El Ni帽o can be felt by the entire planet.鈥�