Page 20 - Annonce 6

Why Does It Stand Steady? lasts for ten thousand years. The Earth completes
When describing the Earth’s rotation around itself, one revolution of this wobbling motion in 25,800
we talk about an axis of rotation. The Earth rotates years.
around this axis. If a star is located exactly in the
direction of this axis, the position of that star never Polaris, which is currently pointing north, will stop
changes; no doubt this star will be our pole star! pointing north in the next millennium due to this
All other stars move through the night in a circle wobble, and will be replaced by the star Vega in
around the pole star. The farther any star is from about 13,000 years. Thanks to Vega, which is very
the pole star, the larger this circle becomes. Then it bright, future generations will not have as much

starts to shrink in the direction of the other pole. As difficulty in locating the pole star as we do.
a result of the wobbling movement of the Earth, the This event only applies to people living in the
direction of the rotation axis changes. This causes northern hemisphere. Have you ever thought about
the pole star to change. how people in the Southern hemisphere will find
their way?
The pole star isn’t actually always there. There is
a precession (wobble) motion that the Earth has

periodically. For this reason, the point at which the Aden Giresun
Earth’s rotation axis points in the sky is constantly
changing. This means that the pole star changes
over time. However, this period is not that short and

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