WHAT IS GALACTIC EQUATOR & HOW POLES ARE CHANGING ON 2012?

Question

WHAT IS GALACTIC EQUATOR & HOW POLES ARE CHANGING ON 2012?

Answer 1

The Galactic Equator is not a physical thing - it is just a human construct like the Earth's equator, that helps us understand the geography of the Galaxy.

As for pole shifts...

The magnetic poles move all the time.

There is a geologic record that shows it has happened many times in our past but not at regular intervals. Time between reversals can be 10000 yrs or a million years.

However - we know that the magnetic field does not collapse in the process - if it did, there would be major extinctions that correlate with the geologic record for pole reversals - there is no correlation.

The latest hypothesis is that the Earth's magnetic field gets chaotic, with lots of north and south poles - so we still have a magnetic field, but compasses will be useless. And then it straightens itself back out, but with north and south reverse.

This is actually similar to what the sun does - but the sun does it on a regular 11 year cycle.

As for when it will happen - those people that observe the magnetic field think it will go through its chaotic thing and reverse some time soon based on how it is currently behaving, but that is a hypothesis waiting for the event to occur to be tested, and the exact date certainly is not known.

Now for the rotational axis and its shift:

The axis of the earth does wobble on several known timescales. These wobbles are known as the Milankovic cycles.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovic_...

Basically the axis of the earth’s rotation does not always point to Polaris (the Pole Star); and we are not always inclined at 23.5 deg. So the poles do move relative to the plane of the earth’s orbit around the sun, and relative to the stars – but the shifts are minor.

Answer 2

The "galactic equator" is not a well-defined concept taken seriously by actual astronomers. There is no galactically significant event that will take place in 2012.

Answer 3

<<WHAT IS GALACTIC EQUATOR...>>

I've never heard of it.

<<...& HOW POLES ARE CHANGING ON 2012?>>

You're the one predicting there'll be some kind of change, so you'd better explain it to yourself.

Answer 4

It is an imaginary line bisecting the plane of the Milky Way Galaxy.  We will be 6 degrees off from actual alignment in 2012.  Also, it takes 36 years for us to precess through the galactic equator.  

The magnetic poles are moving all the time.  A complete reversal happens over thousands of years, not an abrupt flip.

"The Earth's magnetic north pole is drifting from northern Canada towards Siberia with a presently accelerating rate — 10km per year at the beginning of the 20th century, up to 40km per year in 2003.  It is also unknown if this drift will continue to accelerate."

"The lava catches Earth's magnetic field in the act of reversing itself. Magnetic north heads south, and -- over about 1,000 years -- the field does a complete flip-flop. While the Oregon data is controversial, Earth scientists agree that the geological evidence as a whole -- the "paleomagnetic" record -- proves such reversals happened many times over the past billion years."