For thousands of years travelers and explorers have relied upon the Earth’s magnetic poles for navigation. The magnetic poles affect migration patterns of animals and other very important functions in nature. Not to mention the magnetic field is responsible for the beautiful Aurora Borealis. In 2000, the axis that the Earth rotates on drastically shifted to the east. In fact, researchers have discovered that the axis has shifted 75 degrees eastward from all normal deviations.

Climate change is the most likely suspect in this drastic change. Increased temperature change is melting the polar ice caps and changing the global sea levels. Much like adding weight to a top and making the spin lopsided, the top itself begins to tilt irregularly. Another contributing factor is the loss of mass in Eurasia due to drought and depletion of aquifers which are also caused by climate change. That kind of weight shift is causing rotational stress that causes hotter global temperatures, rising sea levels and severe weather patterns. If nothing changes, the effects will only become more severe and are already as far as we know, irreparable. Jonathan Overpeck, a professor of geo-sciences states, “this highlights how real and profoundly large an impact humans are having on the planet.”