{"id":244140,"date":"2026-09-17T05:33:36","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T10:33:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/09\/snow-monsoons-and-oceans-shift-earths-center-of-mass-each-year-satellite-tracking-shows"},"modified":"2026-09-17T05:33:36","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T10:33:36","slug":"snow-monsoons-and-oceans-shift-earths-center-of-mass-each-year-satellite-tracking-shows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/09\/snow-monsoons-and-oceans-shift-earths-center-of-mass-each-year-satellite-tracking-shows","title":{"rendered":"Snow, monsoons and oceans shift Earth\u2019s center of mass each year, satellite tracking shows"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/snow-monsoons-and-oceans-shift-earths-center-of-mass-each-year-satellite-tracking-shows2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Seasonal changes redistribute enough water around Earth to shift the planet\u2019s center of mass back and forth by fractions of an inch relative to its geometric center. NASA scientists are on the case, tracking the oscillations because Earth\u2019s center of mass is a crucial reference point for satellite navigation and elevation measurements.<\/p>\n<p>A team led by NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California has proposed a way to calculate the seasonal swings with extreme precision. The technique and findings are detailed in a <a href=\"https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/gji\/article\/247\/2\/ggag314\/8793649?searchresult=1\" target=\"_blank\">new study<\/a> published in <i>Geophysical Journal International<\/i>. The authors paint a vivid picture of springtime thaws, churning oceans and dense winter air shifting massive surface loads from season to season.<\/p>\n<p>The study isn\u2019t the first attempt to pin down Earth\u2019s center of mass. Scientists over the decades have pioneered several space-based techniques to define and locate it. But it\u2019s a moving goalpost. If Earth were a hard blue marble, its center of mass would simply overlap its geometric center. In reality, the planet is sloshing and sagging under the weight of water, ice and air. Because of this, Earth\u2019s center of mass continually swivels around its geometric center by as much as several millimeters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Seasonal changes redistribute enough water around Earth to shift the planet\u2019s center of mass back and forth by fractions of an inch relative to its geometric center. NASA scientists are on the case, tracking the oscillations because Earth\u2019s center of mass is a crucial reference point for satellite navigation and elevation measurements. A team led [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244140"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244140\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}