July 22, 2025: Earth’s Second Shortest Day Due to Accelerated Rotation
Today, July 22, 2025, our planet is set to complete a full rotation 1.34 milliseconds faster than usual. This event marks it as the second-shortest day ever recorded. Such a phenomenon is triggered when the moon reaches its furthest distance from Earth’s equator, thereby influencing our planet’s rotational speed through gravitational forces.
According to scientists, July 10 has already claimed the title for 2025’s shortest day, being 1.36 milliseconds less than the standard 24 hours. Furthermore, they anticipate that August 5 will be 1.25 milliseconds shorter than a typical day. This trend of accelerated rotation is a part of an enigmatic pattern that has seen Earth spinning at its fastest rate since records began in 1973.
While this microscopic time difference may go unnoticed by humans, it could potentially lead to the introduction of a ‘negative leap second’ around 2029 – a concept that has never been implemented before. NASA researchers have associated some of this acceleration to climate change, particularly the movement of ice and groundwater. This has resulted in an increase in day lengths by 1.33 milliseconds per century between 2000 and 2018.
Source: www.space.com