Sunday, October 21, 2007

How El Niño slows the Earth's spin

El Niño has an immense impact on the weather, so great in fact that the ocean warming phenomenon actually makes the planet spin more slowly. Until now, though, no one knew why.

It was also a mystery why the effect did not kick in for several weeks after ocean temperatures reached their peak. Now, Jean Dickey and her colleagues at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena says that the answer is blowing in the wind.

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