Straight Line of the Day: The Magnetic North Pole Is Moving Toward Siberia. Scientists Speculate…

Straight Line of the Day: The Magnetic North Pole is moving toward Siberia. Scientists speculate…


The team of researchers that maintain the World Magnetic Model (WMM) has updated it and released it a year ahead of schedule due to the speed with which the pole is moving. The newly updated model shows the magnetic north pole moving away from Canada and toward Siberia.

The magnetic north pole is the point on the Earth that compasses designate as true north. It is the result of geological processes deep within the planet — molten iron flow creates a magnetic field with poles near the geographic North and South Poles. But unlike the geographic poles, the magnetic poles can move -— and the magnetic north pole has been moving faster in recent years . . .

It is currently not known why the poles drift. Some have suggested it is due to an underground jet stream of sorts. Nor is the mechanism driving them understood. They were only discovered in 1831 -— since that time, both poles have been tracked, and the speed at which they move recorded. The north magnetic pole has traveled 1,400 miles since it was first discovered -— and has changed speed, as well. As recently as 2000, the speed was clocked at 10 km/year. The latest readings show it moving at a brisk 50 km/year.


49 Comments

  1. Astrologers speculate your lucky numbers are 8, 23, 45 and 62. (No, that really doesn’t have anything to do with magnetic north shifting, but then, astrology doesn’t really have anything to do with science.)

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