While there isn’t much I can do to directly help the situation in Japan, I do hope I can help mitigate the panic and worry that can happen due to people blaming this earthquake on the so-called "supermoon" — a date when the Moon is especially close to the Earth at the same time it’s full. So let me be extremely clear:
Despite what a lot of people are saying, there is no way this earthquake was caused by the Moon.
The idea of the Moon affecting us on Earth isn’t total nonsense, but it cannot be behind this earthquake, and almost certainly won’t have any actual, measurable effect on us on March 19, when the full Moon is at its closest.
So, how can I be so sure?
The gravity of the situation
Here’s the deal. The Moon orbits the Earth in an ellipse, so sometimes it’s closer to us and sometimes farther away. At perigee (closest point) it can be as close as 354,000 km (220,000 miles). At apogee, it can be as far as 410,000 km (254,000 miles). Since the Moon orbits the Earth every month or so, it goes between these two extremes every two weeks. So if, say, it’s at apogee on the first of the month, it’ll be at perigee in the middle of the month, two weeks later.
The strength of gravity depends on distance, so the gravitational effects of the Moon on the Earth are strongest at perigee.
However, the Moon is nowhere near perigee right now!
The Moon was at apogee on March 6, and will be at perigee on March 19. When the earthquake in Japan hit last night, the Moon was about 400,000 km (240,000 miles) away. So not only was it not at its closest point, it was actually farther away than it usually is on average.
So again, this earthquake in Japan had nothing to do with the Moon.
Time and tide
So why would people think this is due to the Moon?
On March 19, the Moon will be at perigee –about 354,000 km away. However, on that date it will also be full, and this has an effect on tides.
You can read my detailed essay on tides on my old website. The bullet points are that the Sun has an effect on our tides here on Earth, as does the Moon. When the Sun, Earth, and Moon are near a straight line in space — that is, at new or full Moon — these effects are maximized. We get what are called spring tides, with extra-high high tides, and extra-low low tides.
If this happens at perigee, the effects are even stronger. The tidal force from the Moon can be as much as 50% greater! While that sounds dangerous, it’s not like we’ll see huge earthquakes and roaring tidal waves from this, because even at their strongest, the tidal forces are fairly weak. It does mean people in low-lying regions and who usually experience monthly spring tide floods should take extra precautions, but it won’t be the epic disaster some people are breathlessly claiming.
The pseudoscience
The UK newspaper Daily Mail has a shameful article up asking if the Japan earthquake was caused by this "supermoon". While they do ask a geologist and an astronomer about it — and they both say it’s silly — the article spends quite a bit of its space whipping up fears that the gravity of the Moon will cause volcano eruptions and earthquakes.
I’ll note that the person who is making this claim, and who first called this effect a "supermoon", is an astrologer. Yeah. Let me be clear here as well: astrology doesn’t work. At all.
And that sort of thinking has failed here again. Study after study has shown that big earthquakes are not caused by the Moon, super or otherwise. It would make some sort of sense to think that maybe there is a connection, since the Moon pulls on the Earth, and the majority of earthquakes are caused by tectonic plates slipping past or under each other. However, you can look at the timing of earthquakes versus the distance (and phase) of the Moon, and at best there is a weak correlation between shallow, low intensity quakes and the Moon… and certainly none with major quakes.
Think about it: if there were some connection, and it were this obvious, geologists and seismologists would be issuing warnings every perigee and every full Moon. These are people who have devoted their lives to understanding how the Earth shakes, and would be screaming their heads off if it were something as easy and obvious as the Moon. They don’t because there’s no connection.
A storm isn’t rising
What about weather? This one is a bit tougher.
The tides from the Moon and Sun affect our oceans and large bodies of water, and they also affect the solid Earth — the land under you rises and falls by about a meter every single day as the Earth spins under the Moon!
As it happens, the tides affect the atmosphere as well. Since air is not solid or liquid, and has no real edge, the movement of air up and down due to tides is difficult to measure. But again, we can measure the dates and times of storms and other bad weather and compare it to the Moon, and to the best of my knowledge there is no correlation at all. Remember, meteorologists, like the other scientists I mentioned before, want to save lives. If they thought the Moon had any effect, they’d be all over it!
An article on Accuweather may be at the heart of this. The author repeats the claims of the astrologer I mentioned above, who links storms to the Moon. The article says:
There were SuperMoons in 1955, 1974, 1992 and 2005. These years had their share of extreme weather and other natural events. Is the Super Moon and these natural occurrences a coincidence? Some would say yes; some would say no. I’m not here to pick sides and say I’m a believer or non-believer in subjects like this, but as a scientist I know enough to ask questions and try to find answers.
But as I said before, the gravity of the Moon is strongest at perigee, and the Moon orbits the Earth once a month. There are actually 12 – 13 perigee every single year, so saying there was wild weather in a year when the Moon happened to be at perigee when it was full is meaningless. Unless the wild weather happened on the actual date of the "supermoon" then it must be coincidence, because on other dates the Moon was farther from the Earth!
Mind you, there are tens of thousands of thunderstorms on our planet each and every day, and conditions which give rise to them can take days to build. It’s hard therefore to correlate any given weather system with the Moon.
And it gets worse. Like where the Accuweather article says this:
AccuWeather Facebook fanpage member Daniel Vogler adds, "The last extreme super moon occurred was on January 10th, 2005, right around the time of the 9.0 Indonesia earthquake. That extreme super moon was a new moon. So be forewarned…"
The problem here is that this is total nonsense. The huge Indonesian earthquake was on December 26th, 2004: fully two weeks before the Moon was at perigee. In other words, that earthquake happened when the Moon was nearly at its farthest from the Earth, minimizing its effect on us.
But back to weather: it’s caused by an incredibly complex interaction between the Earth’s rotation, the heat input from the Sun, the way the oceans and seas absorb and radiate heat, and a million other factors. If the Moon contributes in any way, it is very, very small compared to these other massive factors.
Conclusion
We humans like to connect events in our heads, even if they have nothing to do with each other. Skeptics refer to this as "Correlation does not imply causation". In other words, just because two things happen near the same time or place doesn’t mean one actually caused the other. Out of such things are superstitions born.
Or "supermoons". I cannot say that there will be no earthquakes, volcano eruptions, or major storms come March 19 when the full Moon is at perigee. It would be silly to say that, since it’s entirely possible there will be, and in fact, given how common these disasters, I can practically guarantee there will be something that happens on that date! Just as there will be on March 18, and March 20, and June 17, and September 30, and and and.
But I can be fairly certain that if such events happen, they have little or nothing to do with our Moon. And the earthquake in Japan certainly had nothing to do with the Moon, since our satellite was actually closer to its farthest point in its orbit than its nearest!
I expect we’ll be seeing more terrible coverage of this as March 19 approaches. I’m already seeing it on Twitter and in the mainstream media (and we know how bad they are at covering science), and getting lots of emails from people who are hearing it from friends and family.
[UPDATE: I just found out PopSci has a solid, matter-of-fact article debunking this as well. Good on them! They even coincidentally used the same Moon picture I did.]
[UPDATE 2: Add the Washington Post to that list of good media, too.]
I hope that this article will put some of those fears to rest.
But I’ll leave you with this: if there is any good to come of these doomsday scares, it’s that they remind us that the Earth is a volatile place, and we are subject to disaster, sometimes without warning. Preparing yourself is rational and the smart thing to do! If you live in an area prone to natural disasters like earthquakes, severe weather, flooding, or what-have-you, check with your local government or the Red Cross to see what you can do to be prepared. When I lived in California we had an earthquake kit in the house, for example.
The earthquake in Japan — and other natural disasters likely to happen in the next few days, weeks, and months — are terrible tragedies. We’re not making it any better by panicking over something we know isn’t real. In the long run, and even the short term, it’s science that will help us learn about these events, understand them better, and save lives. Keep a level head, think rationally, and do what you can to be prepared and to help if and when the time comes.
This coming March 19, 2011, the moon will be at its closest point to our planet earth in 18 years - a mere 356,577 kilometers away. Astrologer Richard Nolle called it a "supermoon" back in the 1970s. This phenomenon is also called ‘lunar perigee’ the opposite of the ‘lunar apogee’ when the Moon is furthest from Earth. Supermoon is described a new or full moon at 90% or more of its closest orbit to Earth. On the 19th, it will be at 100%.
A number of astronomers predict that this phenomenon was worrying, because it will have an effect on climate patterns on Earth. Some people connect the lunar perigee or supermoon with catastrophe, like earthquakes.
Emeritus Professor for Astronomy and Planetary Science Department, Peter Goldreich at Caltech University, notes that he and a number of other scientists have studied the moon for decades and have not at all found it to cause these natural disasters.
Gordon Johnston, Planetary Program Executive for NASA, told FoxNews.com that “These will be the strongest tides of the month, but they won’t be much different from last year. They’re not that unusual from other tides around the full moon.”
“This coming full moon will be the brightest of the year,” Johnston added. The sky will be very stunning to photograph, so, don’t ever forget to bring your cameras.
suequisel is based in Dumaguete, Central Visayas, Philippines, and is Reporter for Allvoices
March 19, the moon will be at its closest to planet Earth
Supermoon
In astrology, a supermoon is a full or new moon that coincides with a close approach by the Moon to the Earth. The Moon's distance varies each month between approximately 354,000 km (220,000 mi) and 410,000 km (254,000 mi).[1][2]
Definition
The term supermoon was coined by astrologer Richard Nolle in 1979, defined as
| “ |
...a new or full moon which occurs with the Moon at or near (within 90% of) its closest approach to Earth in a given orbit (perigee). In short, Earth, Moon and Sun are all in a line, with Moon in its nearest approach to Earth.[3] |
” |
The term supermoon is not widely accepted or used within the astronomy or scientific community, who prefer the term perigee-syzygy.[4]
Effect on tides
The combined effect of the Sun and Moon on Earth's oceans, the tide, is greatest when the Moon is new or full.[5] Full Moons during lunar perigees (such as in the case of supermoons) exert an even stronger tidal force, resulting in more extreme high and low tides, but even at their most powerful this force is still considerably weak.[6]
Link to natural disasters
Speculations of a link between the occurrence of supermoons and natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunami are extremely tenuous. Arguments have been made that natural disasters coinciding with years in which supermoons occurred were influenced by the Moon's increased gravitational strength, though because of the monthly alternation between lunar apogee and perigee such an argument cannot be supported unless the disaster in question falls on the actual date of the supermoon.[1]
It has been argued that the Indian Ocean tsunami and earthquake on December 26, 2004, was influenced by a supermoon which occurred 2 weeks later on January 10, 2005.[7] However two weeks before a supermoon the Moon is at the opposite point in its orbit: its apogee (greatest distance). Thus a supermoon effect is impossible.[1][8]
Most recently, astrologers argued that the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan on March 11, 2011, was influenced by the March 19 supermoon, the closest supermoon since 1992.[9] The problem with this claim is that on March 11 the Moon was actually closer to apogee than perigee, at approximately 400,000 km (240,000 mi) from the Earth, which is further than the average distance between the Moon and the Earth throughout the Moon's orbital cycle.[1]
While some studies have reported a weak correlation between shallow, very low intensity earthquakes and lunar activity, there is no empirical evidence of any correlation with major earthquakes.[10][11][12]
Dates of supermoons between 1950 and 2050
There are approximately 4-6 supermoons annually.[3] The following is a list of past and predicted extreme supermoons.[13][14]
- November 10, 1954
- November 20, 1972
- January 8, 1974
- February 26, 1975
- December 2nd, 1990
- January 19, 1992
- March 8, 1993
- January 10, 2005
- December 12, 2008
- January 30, 2010
- March 19, 2011
- November 14, 2016
- January 2nd, 2018
- January 21st, 2023
- November 25, 2034
- January 13, 2036
References
- ^ a b c d Plait, Phil. "No, the “supermoon” didn’t cause the Japanese earthquake". Discover Magazine. http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/03/11/no-the-supermoon-didnt-cause-the-japanese-earthquake/. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published March 11, 2011.
- ^ Hawley, John. "Appearance of the Moon Size". Ask a Scientist. Newton. http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/phy99/phy99371.htm. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date.
- ^ a b Nolle, Richard. "Supermoon". Astropro. http://www.astropro.com/features/articles/supermoon/. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date; modified March 10, 2011.
- ^ Ledermann, Tug. "'Perigee-syzygy' caused full moon to look bigger, brighter in October". University Wire. http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-146006378.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published November 13, 2007.
- ^ Plait, Phil. "Tides, the Earth, the Moon, and why our days are getting longer". Bad Astronomy. http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/tides.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published 2008; modified March 5, 2011.
- ^ "Apogee and Perigee of the Moon". Moon Connection. http://www.moonconnection.com/apogee_perigee.phtml. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date.
- ^ Paquette, Mark. "Extreme Super (Full) Moon to Cause Chaos?". Astronomy Weather Blog. AccuWeather. http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/astronomy/story/46417/extreme-super-full-moon-to-cause-chaos.asp. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published March 1, 2011.
- ^ Byrd, Deborah. "Debunking the "Supermoon" Theory of Japan's Earthquake and Tsunami". Fast Company. http://www.fastcompany.com/1737710/the-supermoon-and-japans-89-magnitude-earthquake. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published March 11, 2011.
- ^ "Is the Japanese earthquake the latest natural disaster to have been caused by a 'supermoon'?". The Daily Mail. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1365225/Japan-earthquake-tsunami-Did-supermoon-cause-todays-natural-disaster.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published March 11, 2011.
- ^ "Can the position of the moon affect seismicity?". The Berkeley Seismological Laboratory. http://seismo.berkeley.edu/faq/planets.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; published 1999.
- ^ Fuis, Gary. "Can the position of the moon or the planets affect seismicity?". U.S. Geological Survey: Earthquake Hazards Program. http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learn/faq/?faqID=109. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date.
- ^ Wolchover, Natalie. "Will the March 19 'Supermoon' Trigger Natural Disasters?". Life's Little Mysteries. http://www.lifeslittlemysteries.com/will-supermoon-cause-earthquake-storm-natural-disasters-1442/. Retrieved 15 March 2011; published March 9, 2011.
- ^ Nolle, Richard. "20th Century SuperMoon Alignments". Astropro. http://www.astropro.com/features/tables/cen20ce/suprmoon.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date.
- ^ Nolle, Richard. "21st Century SuperMoon Alignments". Astropro. http://www.astropro.com/features/tables/cen21ce/suprmoon.html. Retrieved 14 March 2011; no publication date.
Richard Nolle is a graduate of the University of Florida. He holds the Professional Certificate of Proficiency in Natal Astrology from the American Federation of Astrologers. In 30+ years of practice, Nolle has counseled thousands of clients. He's the author of four books, and a columnist and feature writer for Dell Publishing Company's HOROSCOPE magazine from 1975 to 1992. Nolle's work has been published in all the top U.S. astrology magazines and in the interdisciplinary scientific journal Cycles. 
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پاییز سال ۲۰۰۴ بود كه گونتر ورهوگن، كمیسر توسعه اروپا با خوشحالی در مورد حرف های رجب طیب اردوغان، نخست وزیر تركیه گفت: واقعا عالی است! اردوغان با او در مورد طرحی انقلابی سخن گفته بود؛ او قصد داشت قانون تركیه را تغییر دهد و به این ترتیب از زنانی كه شوهرانشان تركشان كرده بودند و آنها از اموال مشتركشان بی بهره بودند، حمایت كند. به اعتقاد ورهوگن آلمانی این كار یك پیشرفت اجتماعی بسیار خوب محسوب می شد و می توانست شرایط پیوستن این كشور به اتحادیه اروپایی را فراهم كند. 
