Our daily schedule is shaped by many spinning events, whether it’s the rotation of the planets around the sun or shift workers shifting between night shifts and day shifts. Some of them happen daily and some are unpredictable and irregular.
The most frequent of these periodic events is precessionthe Earth’s cyclical wobble around its axis of rotation, just like a spinny, slightly off-center toy top. This angular shift in relation to fixed stars (inertial space) has a cycle of 25,771.5 years. This is also the reason why amusement parks like Ferris wheels and carousels have to be built with a solid side-to-side bar, referred to as an axle. An axle is a Coriolis effect is another moving event. It is a mysterious force that pushes a freely moving body system, which influences its revolving motion on a scale of weather. This is responsible for numerous weather patterns, including the alternating direction of cyclones that occur on the upper and southern hemispheres.
While the majority of people are aware that the Earth rotates around its axis 24 hours a day but many are unaware that the speed of this rotation can vary. Days can appear to be longer or shorter than they actually be. This is why the atomic clocks which maintain standard time have to be periodically adjusted. This kind of change is referred to a leap second. This article will explain how it happens and why it matters to our everyday lives.
