We all have read about Earth since our childhood and you may think that you might know almost everything about our blue planet. But do you? Time to find out. Be prepared to be shocked and amazed as to how much our mother Earth has in store for you to surprise and amaze you. Here are our top ten intriguing picks:
1. We do not know who named the “Earth”
Regarded as one of the most baffling, jaw dropping mysteries, unlike other planets, no real historical data can be found on the person that named our planet “Earth.” The term Earth comes from Old English and High Germanic and is the only planet not named after a Greek or Roman god. The name Earth is at least 1000 years old. Translations of the Bible into English was one of the earliest recorded use of the name Earth – ” God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good”.
2. There’s uneven gravity
Because our globe isn’t a perfect sphere, its mass is distributed unevenly. Uneven mass means slightly uneven gravity.
One mysterious gravitational anomaly is in the Hudson Bay of Canada. This area has lower gravity than other regions, and a 2007 study finds that now melted glaciers are to blame. Since gravity over an area is proportional to the mass atop that region, and the glacier’s imprint pushed aside some of the Earth’s mass, gravity is a bit less strong. The Earth’s gravity field changes from one month to the next mostly due to the mass of water moving around on the surface.
3. Earth once had two moons
Earth may once have had two moons. A second moon spanning about 1,200 km wide may have orbited Earth before it catastrophically slammed into the other one. This clash may explain why the two sides of the surviving moon are so different from each other. Some scientists claim Earth has two moons currently. According to researchers reporting in the Dec. 20, 2011, issue of the planetary science journal ICARUS, a space rock at least 3.3-meter (1-meter) wide orbits Earth at any given time. They’re not always the same rock, but rather an ever-changing cast of “temporary moons,” say the scientists.
4. You can see Earth shrinking from space
“Groundwater pumping can cause significant land surface subsidence enough so that it can be ‘seen’ from space.” scientists say. It is being pumped and consumed by human activities, principally to irrigate cropland, faster than the aquifers can be replenished by natural processes. Researchers use satellites and GPS stations to track how far the Earth has sunk. Changes in underground water masses affect gravity enough to provide a signal, such that changes in gravity can be translated into a measurement of an equivalent change in water.
Groundwater levels have been declining by an average of one meter every three years.
5. The days are getting longer
The length of Earth’s day is increasing. When Earth was formed 4.6 billion years ago, its day would have been roughly six hours long. By 620 million years ago, this had increased to 21.9 hours. Today, the average day is 24 hours long, but is increasing by about 1.7 milliseconds every century. The reason? The moon is slowing down Earth’s rotation through the tides that it helps create and they create a twisting force that slows down Earth’s rotation. As a result, our day is getting longer, but not long enough to make a difference to your busy schedule.
6. Continents are always on the move
About 250 million years ago, all the continents we see today were one big supercontinent called Pangaea. They’ve slowly moved ever since to spread out and form the continents we see today: North America, South America, Africa, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Antarctica. But Pangaea wasn’t the first supercontinent. About 800 million years ago, all the continents were pushed together too. We call this previous supercontinent Rodinia.
7. There wasn’t just one ice age
You may have heard of the Ice Age on Earth. It was a time when woolly mammoths roamed. But this didn’t just happen one time 30,000 years ago. There may have been as many as four different Ice Ages in the past. During these times, Earth would have been covered completely in ice fostering different species that could survive the climate.
8. The planet’s poles flip
Earth’s north magnetic pole is creeping northward by about 40 miles a year. And given that the last major pole reversal happened 780,000 years ago, we are overdue for a flip. Over the past 20 million years, the magnetic poles have flip-flopped every several hundred thousand years or so, which means that if you had a compass in hand about 800,000 years ago, it would tell you that north was in Antarctica, but today we all know that South pole is in Antarctica. Strange!
9. Oh well, that’s quick!
If you drilled a tunnel straight through the Earth and jumped in, then it would take you about 42 minutes to get to the other side! You can travel halfway around the world in less than an hour, all you need to do is jump… down. Into that enormous tunnel bored right through the Earth connecting your location with the exact opposite spot on the Earth.
10. We are inhaling a lot of cosmic dust daily!
Tons of cosmic dust falls to the Earth daily and it is highly likely that you have inhaled it while your morning walk or a picnic! Dust from comets, meteorites and other celestial bodies that falls to Earth also increases the sodium and iron levels in the atmosphere. Researches estimate that about 60 tons of this cosmic dust descend to the Earth daily.
