We are at the doors of the “shortest” day of our lives

If you feel that days are less, maybe it is because our planet has stepped on the accelerator. Since 2020, and for reasons that Astronomers are still investigatingthe Earth has been rotating on its axis at a speed slightly higher than usual, beating all records since we have atomic measurements. The next record could happen in a few days.

The shortest documented day. According to predictions of astrophysicist Graham Jonesthere are three key dates in 2025 in which the Earth could register its fastest turn since there are records: July 9, on July 22 or August 5, 2025.

In one of those three days there will be all the conditions for the Earth to approach or exceed the historical record so far, which is not very distant: on July 5, 2024. Other experts do not have it so clear and believe that the shortest day of this year could remain some milliseconds above the record last year.

An anomaly of milliseconds. A solar day lasts 86,400 seconds; That is, 24 hours. However, the rotation of the earth is not perfect and has tiny variations. These fluctuations are translated into milliseconds above or below the reference figurethat we can measure thanks to the precision of atomic watches.

Until 2020, the shortest day registered lacked 1.05 milliseconds for 24 hours. But since then, every year has overcome that threshold. In 2021, the shortest day was 24 hours – 1,47 ms; In 2022, it was 24 hours −1.59 ms; In 2023 it rose to 24 hours −1.31 ms and in 2024 he came down again, marking the current record. The shortest day ever documented was on July 5 of last year, which lasted 24 hours -1.66 ms.

Why this summer. The dates planned for 2025 coincide with the moments in which the moon orbit places it at its furthest point from the Earth’s Ecuador. The lunar position influences the speed of rotation of our planet, although it is not the main factor of the current acceleration, which remains a mystery.

The most fascinating thing about this acceleration is that it goes against the trend. For billions of years, The Moon has been braking the rotation of the Earth. About 4.5 billion years ago, one day on Earth it lasted between three and six hours. The gravitational attraction of the Moon generates the tides, and this constant friction of the oceans has been stealing angular momentum to the earth, which slows its speed.

No one expected this acceleration. The models that scientists usually use take into account ocean currents and atmospheric movements, but fail to explain this sudden acceleration. The main hypothesis points to complex and still little understood processes In the core of our planet. The planet’s engine has “changed marching.”

If this braking trend continued without interruption, in about 50,000 million years, the rotation of the earth would be synchronized with the orbit of the moon. The result would be a “tide blocking” where the earth would always show the same face to the moon, so that our satellite would only be visible from the middle of the planet. In any case, we will not be here. Within about 10,000 million years, the sun will become a white dwarf. Already by then, the earth will take time being uninhabitable.

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