Hi guys, I'm new to the Forums, and have an interesting question for you.

 

So I was wondering what do you guys think would happen here on earth if the moon had a sudden shift in it's orbit.

 

I have heard some interesting ideas, but just wondering what you think...

 

Shmoo

It depends on how the shift happened, because energy, momentum and angular momentum are conserved — the quantities would change with a shift in the moon's orbit. The response of the earth would depend on what actually happened.

 

If the moon were simply in a different orbit, then there would be a difference in the strength of the tides and probably in the amount of precession and nutation of the earth.

 

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And to whoever hacked the editor:

Oh, you magnificent bastard!

Catastrophic tidal changes, possibly of tsunami-like proportions, all around the world. (I would suspect, at least.)

Nothing sudden, but many feel the moon's orbit has increased since formation, from about 24k miles to todays 240k mile average. We do know it moves away about 2 inches per year or so...

 

On a reverse idea; Some suggest that Venus had a moon some time ago, while rotating pretty much as earth. That a large object or objects, with a certain trajectory hit Venus, changing its rotation, actually reversing it, which over time caused that moon to fall to Venus.

Hi guys, I'm new to the Forums, and have an interesting question for you.

 

So I was wondering what do you guys think would happen here on earth if the moon had a sudden shift in it's orbit.

 

I have heard some interesting ideas, but just wondering what you think...

 

Shmoo

 

Shmoo, we have have a orbital/Axis shift it just happens to have happened to the earth and this may well be some of the reasons the weather has been so irradic the last few years. you can see the evidence here on this website http://www.divulgence.net/ . I think it happened when that large Tsunami that hit Sumatra,Indonesia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake it was reported breifly on CNN but quickly dissappeared from the news.