Earth, a veteran planet known more for its guile than for the quickness and explosiveness of its youth, put on a vintage performance earlier this summer, completing its fastest rotation on record. All the haters and doubters who counted the earth are now sobbing.
On June 29, the Earth completed a complete rotation in 1.59 milliseconds, 1.59 milliseconds shorter than the league average of 24 hours, a breathtaking athletic feat witnessed by an estimated 7.97 billion viewers. This sets the record for the fastest rotation of the Earth since statistics began to be tracked In 1955 with the advent of the first practical atomic clock. But as we all know, athletes only get stronger and faster; at the time, Earth was competing with a bunch of plumbers and postal workers.
Confirmed by the world record International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Servicegoverning body for time itself and First reported by Timeanddate, the premier fan blog for time news, time scores and time trade rumors. As Timeanddate points out, June’s record high didn’t come for nothing. Well, it came in the vacuum of space, but you know what I mean; Earth is enjoying a late career resurgence. Although the Earth has generally rotated more slowly since its early years (about three milliseconds per day per century; so a day would have been about 23 hours and 30 minutes long at the end of the Cretaceous), the last few seasons have seen the Earth rotate more and more. Faster
The reasons for Earth’s return as player of the year are unclear. Some credit to the new training regime; others new off-season diet. Others speculate that Earth’s coach changed from Sun to a play-calling philosophy that better suited Earth’s abilities. Earth, too, has been abuzz with whispers of PGH (planetary growth hormone) use, although those rumors have been spread by its closest rivals, Mars and Venus. “Of course it’s weird” University of Tasmania Professor Matt King said. “Obviously something has changed.”
Scientists, mostly sabermetric nerds, have a number of theories, and one of the most popular is the isostatic adjustment of glaciers. In this scenario, climate change melts the ice caps, thereby reducing Earth’s weight at the poles, compressing the Earth, which is wider than it is tall, into a shape that is slightly closer to a sphere. Like figure skaters pulling their arms in, this would make the Earth spin faster.
Another theory involves Chandler Wobble, is the periodic movement of the center of rotation. Over the past few years—probably driven by changes in ocean circulation—the surge has decreased to a historic minimum; Earth has been more like a football thrown in a tight spiral than a Peyton Manningesque wounded duck.
“Given that changes in both things can be linked to mass moving across the Earth’s surface, it’s probably not a bad possibility that these things are related in some way.” King said. “I don’t know if we’re that far along in understanding what’s going on, but I daresay there’s probably something going on in the climate system or the oceans.”
For whatever reason or reasons, Earth’s recent performance has been so impressive that they are considering changing the rules of the sport. A few more years of less than 24 hours and we’ll need our first “negative leap second”—a jump of one second in the International Atomic Clock, the official global time, to realign it. Earth’s rotation. Sure, Barry Bonds hit a lot of dingers and set a lot of records. But did he literally make us jump forward in time? Earth is the best place to do it.
