Earth Shifted on it's Axis?

Dan just brought some new data concerning Friday's earthquake in Japan. First off, according to Eryn Brown of the LA Times, the quake has been upgraded to a mind numbing magnitude 9.0 by the Japan Meteorological Agency! Plus according to Richard Gross, a geophysicist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the quake probably shifted the position of Earth's axis about 6.5 inches, causing the Earth to rotate somewhat faster, shortening the length of the day by about 1.8 microseconds! Just as amazing is data that shows that that the temblor's force moved parts of eastern Japan as much as 12 feet closer to North America

Earth Bumped off it's Axis

If you ever doubted the vast power released during a

According to NASA's website:

• The Feb. 27 magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile may have shortened the length of each Earth day.
• JPL research scientist Richard Gross computed how Earth's rotation should have changed.
• Using a complex model, he and fellow scientists came up with a preliminary calculation that the quake should have shortened the length of an Earth day by about 1.26 microseconds.

What is even more amazing is that Chilean quake may have shifted the whole planet off it's axis by as much as 3 inches!

By comparison - estimates of the 2004 magnitude 9.1 Sumatran earthquake should have shortened the length of day by 6.8 microseconds and shifted the axis by 2.76 inches.

Off course these are estimates and are likely to change as more data comes in.

Read NASA article here