What do you think would happen if the Earth stopped rotating?

Answer 1

If the Earth stopped rotating, one half of the world would be in daylight all the time, and the other half would be night all the time, and this would have unfortunate consequences. Half the world would overheat very badly while the other half would freeze. Very strong winds would be created as well, by this extreme temperature difference. Even if these problems were manageable, it would still be true that in half the world, because of the lack of sunlight there would be no growing plants, and hence, very limited sources of food. The human race, if it survived at all, would have quite a hard time on a world that did not rotate.
the sun would stay shining in one place casing night forever in one place and sun forever in the other
Depends on how fast it happens,

at the current rate of slowing it will never happen

(the sun sun consumes us first.)

If the earth stops spinning there will be massive earthquakes and tsunamis and really bad weather possibly ++++ Please explain how.
The earth will be comsumed by the sun long before it has a chance to stop rotating.
Of course the likelihood of this actually happening in the next few hundred million years is just about zero. But we can still speculate on what would happen anyway.

At the equator, Earth is rotating at a speed of about 1050 miles per hour. If our planet suddenly stopped rotating, the atmosphere would still be in motion at that speed. The atmosphere would be moving so fast it would literally sweep the land masses clear of anything not anchored to bedrock, this would mean rocks, soil, trees, buildings, people and animals. All would be swept up into the atmosphere.

If the Earth's rotation slowed down gradually over billions of years, and this is the most likely scenario, it would be a very different story. Ignoring the future of the Sun, the Earth and Moon should eventually be "tidally locked" with the Moon and Earth always showing the same face to each other. In this situation the oceans' tides would effectively disappear.

The Moon would then appear stationary in our sky. At that time, the Earth's rotation period would be about 47 times the length of the present Earth day.

If the Earth slowed down to one rotation for one orbit around the Sun, then most areas on Earth would either be in permanent sunlight or in permanent darkness. Then, the Earth would be in "synchronous rotation" around the Sun.

But what if the Earth could stop rotating completely? In that case, one half of the Earth would be in daylight for half the year while the other side would be in darkness. The second half of the year it would be reversed. Temperature variations would be far more extreme then they are now. The temperature gradient would affect the wind circulation too. Also, there would be no "Coriolis" effect. So, air would move from the equator to the poles and vice versa rather then in wind systems parallel to the equator, as they are now.

Even stranger would be the change in the Sun's position in the sky. In the case where the Earth's rotation period equals its orbital period, the Sun would just have a seasonal motion up and down the sky, due to the orbit of the Earth and its axial tilt.

Now, consider the case of the Earth having no rotation at all. You would see the seasonal change of the Sun's position combined with a very slow apparent motion of the Sun, due to the Earth's very long new "day" length. The Sun would now rise in the West not in the East.

There would be other effects of the Earth's rotation slowing also. The magnetic field of the Earth is generated by a dynamo effect that involves its rotation. If the Earth stopped rotating, the magnetic field would no longer be regenerated and it would decay away to some low, residual value due to the very small component which is 'fossilized' in its iron-rich rocks. There would be no more 'northern lights' and the Van Allen radiation belts would probably vanish, as would our protection from cosmic rays and other high-energy particles. Losing this protection would cause serious health issues.

Be glad for our Earthly rotation, without it we would be much worse off!
It would fry on one side and freeze on the other side.

The "hot side" and "cold side" would gradually alternate during the year, as the Earth orbited the Sun.
If I'm correct, one side of the Earth would be really hot and pretty much burn and the other side would be incredibly cold.

Comment: If the Earth did not rotate at all, the hot and cold periods would alternate every six months or so. (This is not the same as "synchronous rotation", of course.)
If the earth did not rotate, many processes that we take for granted would be disrupted or even stop entirely. A couple examples:

• day and night would change only with the orbit of the earth around the sun: day would last half a year and night would as well - this would create a whole new system of seasons and life/growth patterns
• the Coriolis effect, which displaces air and water and drives many wind and ocean currents, would no longer exist
• Gravity would be affected or even cease to exisit

Everything that was free to move would continue to move in the direction of Earth's rotation at 1,000 miles per hour.

That's only if the Earth stopped rotating suddenly, of course. Also the speed of the Earth's rotation is only as high as about 1000 mph at the equator.
If somehow the Earth stops rotating completely, we will have months of all daylight then months of all night.

Also there would be other effects: The magnetic field would probably disappear, as would the tides (more or less).

Also, the winds would change direction, because there would be no "Coriolis effect".
The abrupt stoppage of the Earth's rotation is practically impossible. Assuming that the rotation ceased gradually, rather than abruptly (the eventual result of tidal forces), there would be many changes to the planet.

-- Most places on earth would begin to have roughly 6-month days and roughly

6-month nights. When the sun rose at your house, it would take 6 months to

cross the sky to the opposite horizon and set.

-- The nights would coincide with longer, colder, Winters, and the days would coincide with longer, warmer Summers.

-- When the moon rose at your house, it would take the equivalent of 13 2/3 (24-hour) days to cross the sky to the opposite horizon and set. During that time, it would go through about 46% of a complete cycle of phases.

-- Instead of 2 high tides and two low tides a day, there would be 2 high tides

and 2 low tides a month, and they would be higher and lower than they are

now, respectively.

-- Agriculture and nutrition would be real problems, for anybody who felt like

growing or eating anything besides mushrooms and nightcrawlers, unless he

could afford to buy food shipped in from the other side of the world.

-- Storms and other weather systems would be more extreme, because hot areas would be hotter and cold areas colder, and there would be greater extremes of temperature for heat to flow between.

-- But weather systems would not rotate, as all Coriolis forces would disappear. Winds would blow straight into the middle of low-pressure systems, and straight out of high-pressure systems. Since high pressure is associated with cold, and low pressure with heat, the prevailing wind patterns would be from the dark half of the earth to the light half, the entire global pattern rotating slowly around the earth on an annual basis as the earth revolved around the sun, with the average global source of wind being the place that was almost finished with its 6-month night, and the average global wind destination being a little less than half the world away, somewhere around the "mid-afternoon" zone.

-- Whatever stars were in your sky during your six months of dark would never

change. You could never see the other half of the sky without traveling to a

different place on the Earth.

-- The equatorial bulge of the planet would disappear, with gradual (but possibly drastic) seismic changes to the crust, especially land surfaces.
If the Earth stopped rotating, it would become geologically dormant. Life would be impossible to sustain. We would lose our magnetic field and become exposed to the elements of space (e.g. solar radiation). And if the Earth were to come to a sudden stop, everything would go flying at thousands of miles per hour.
Everything that was free to move would continue to move in the direction of Earth's rotation at 1,000 miles per hour.

That's only if the Earth stopped rotating suddenly, of course. Also the speed of the Earth's rotation is only as high as about 1000 mph at the equator.
If somehow the Earth stops rotating completely, we will have months of all daylight then months of all night.

Also there would be other effects: The magnetic field would probably disappear, as would the tides (more or less).

Also, the winds would change direction, because there would be no "Coriolis effect".
The abrupt stoppage of the Earth's rotation is practically impossible. Assuming that the rotation ceased gradually, rather than abruptly (the eventual result of tidal forces), there would be many changes to the planet.

-- Most places on earth would begin to have roughly 6-month days and roughly

6-month nights. When the sun rose at your house, it would take 6 months to

cross the sky to the opposite horizon and set.

-- The nights would coincide with longer, colder, Winters, and the days would coincide with longer, warmer Summers.

-- When the moon rose at your house, it would take the equivalent of 13 2/3 (24-hour) days to cross the sky to the opposite horizon and set. During that time, it would go through about 46% of a complete cycle of phases.

-- Instead of 2 high tides and two low tides a day, there would be 2 high tides

and 2 low tides a month, and they would be higher and lower than they are

now, respectively.

-- Agriculture and nutrition would be real problems, for anybody who felt like

growing or eating anything besides mushrooms and nightcrawlers, unless he

could afford to buy food shipped in from the other side of the world.

-- Storms and other weather systems would be more extreme, because hot areas would be hotter and cold areas colder, and there would be greater extremes of temperature for heat to flow between.

-- But weather systems would not rotate, as all Coriolis forces would disappear. Winds would blow straight into the middle of low-pressure systems, and straight out of high-pressure systems. Since high pressure is associated with cold, and low pressure with heat, the prevailing wind patterns would be from the dark half of the earth to the light half, the entire global pattern rotating slowly around the earth on an annual basis as the earth revolved around the sun, with the average global source of wind being the place that was almost finished with its 6-month night, and the average global wind destination being a little less than half the world away, somewhere around the "mid-afternoon" zone.

-- Whatever stars were in your sky during your six months of dark would never

change. You could never see the other half of the sky without traveling to a

different place on the Earth.

-- The equatorial bulge of the planet would disappear, with gradual (but possibly drastic) seismic changes to the crust, especially land surfaces.
If the Earth stopped rotating, it would become geologically dormant. Life would be impossible to sustain. We would lose our magnetic field and become exposed to the elements of space (e.g. solar radiation). And if the Earth were to come to a sudden stop, everything would go flying at thousands of miles per hour.
If it just stopped immediately, with no decent time lag between slowing down and stopping, then everything would go flying off it.

If it slowed down at a rate so that this did not happen, eventually the atmosphere would be stripped away by the solar wind, and anything sitll alive when it did stop would be largely affected by the lack of protection the earth's magnetic field usually offers (the field being produced by the spinning).