this is a really good answer that i found on a different sight. :
An impending magnetic, or pole, reversal was one of the hot topics of
the 80's when the book "Pole Shift" by John White was a best seller
and it was thought that it might happen any time now.
As with most prophesies around the end of the twentieth century, the
sense of impending doom has lessened and the pole shift "warning" has
been downgraded to a pole shift "watch"
But this is one of those things that are very probably going to happen
at some point "soon" in the earth's history....it's just that mankind
has a very small view of the overall earth clock, and to the earth,
"soon" could mean anytime in the next 100,000 years, so don't hold
your breath. Scientists currently tell us that pole shifts occur, on
average, once every 500,000 years. The last pole shift was 780,000
years ago so we are overdue for one (just as we are overdue for a big
asteroid strike, and for a super volcano eruption....just hope they
don't all happen at once!)
The planet's geologic record has very clear evidence that pole shifts
have occurred many times in the past and there is no doubt that they
will occur again. ( The phenomenon referred to here as a "pole shift"
is not the shifting of the crust by thousands of miles, but rather,
changes in the magnetic field of the planet. Some unscrupulous writers
in the 70s and 80s tried to imply that the continents were going to
start sliding about like melting ice on a hot plate, but that's not
current scientific thinking.)
However, its not all good news. Until recently, it was thought that
pole shifts were a gradual process. But recent evidence from studying
the alignment of iron particles in lava flows found one case where the
Earth's magnetic field shifted 80 degrees in 13 days.
What would a pole shift do to life on Earth?
Compasses would obviously be effected as would all navigational
instruments which depend on them. So shipping, air-flight and all GPS
equipment, including satellites, would be off-line until we figured
out how to cope with the reversal. Global trade would be brought
quickly to a standstill, and the winners would probably turn out to be
those that remembered how to navigate in the old ways, such as nomadic
people and sea-farers on old sailing ships
Migratory birds, fish and animals would become confused. This might
lead to them wandering far from current feeding and breeding grounds,
into areas not suitable for them, and could quite easily be concieved
as leading to mass extinctions, habitat destruction and loss of life,
both animal and human.
While this latter theory is controversial, scientists have already
shown that insects can actually be killed as a result of fluctuations
in magnetic fields around them, and the same experimenters have shown
similar, though smaller, effects in humans, leaving them dazed and
confused. If you consider the number of humans involved in operating
machinery that would be life-threatening in the case of faulty
operation, you can see that global effects would probably be large.
In addition large scale fluctuations in magnetic fields would knock
out power suppliers, and all electro-magnetic communication could
concievably be disrupted for long periods of time.
A rapid magnetic reversal would include very large scale fluctuations
in the Earth's magnetic field, which extends out 60,000 km from the
surface of the planet. It is also thought by many doomsayers that a
diminished magnetic field which shields us from energetic particles
emitted continuously by the sun would leave us vulnerable to the
harmful effects of magnetic storms spawned by solar flares and sun
spots. This would probably be hazardous to our health :)
BUT the magnetic field does not protect the earth from solar flares.
It simply
guides the ions of the solar wind to the polar regions, where their
energetic collisions with the upper atmosphere produce the luminous
plasma
known as the Northern and Southern Lights (Aurora Borealis and Aurora
Australis). It is the earth's atmosphere that actually prevents the
solar
wind from reaching the surface, and that is independent of the
magnetic field.
It is thought by some geologists that a rapid switch in the magnetic
field could lead to stresses in rock strata and lead to major
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, with the possible scenario of the
"Ring of Fire" all going off at once and sending the world into
nuclear winter.
So, if you consider a world with no TV, radio, telephones (fixed or
mobile), computers, shop-tills, no planes,no ships, no radar, no air
traffic control, where weapons of mass destruction were likely to go
off without human intervention, and nuclear subs suddenly started
spontaneously exploding while aged power stations lost all their
regulatory barriers, you'll get an idea of the possibilities. Think of
all the disasters they were warning about for the so called "Millenium
Bug" in 2000, then imagine them all actually happening.
Then imagine the earth shaking, hot ash falling on your head, a tidal
wave approaching, and a migratory herd of Wildebeest turning up on
your doorstep.
As for the UN....they'd pass a resolution against it, but it would
happen anyway. But what else is new?
Hope that answers your question
Geomagnetic storms!
Scientists want to predict solar winds in Earth's atmosphere to help them track geomagnetic storms. Geomagnetic storms can disrupt the Earth's magnetosphere.
A geomagnetic reversal is a change in the orientation of Earth's magnetic field such that the positions of magnetic north and magnetic south become interchanged. These events often involve an extended decline in field strength followed by a rapid recovery after the new orientation has been established. These events occur on a scale of tens of thousands of years or longer.more info herehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal
The angle between the geographic north and the geomagnetic north is 11.5 degrees..
In a geomagnetic reversal, the south and north magnetic poles flip locations. A magnetic pole reversal takes place every 450,000 years on average, but this is not regular. We are way overdue since the last reversal was 780,000 years ago. There is a pattern in the magnetic polarity of basaltic rocks on opposite sides of a mid-ocean ridge. Basalt contains tiny magnetic crystals that point to the location of the north magnetic pole at the time the lava cools. The rocks at the ridge have positive polarity, but on either side of the ridge the polarity is negative, indicating that those lavas cooled when the magnetic field was opposite of what it is today. On either side of the basalt with negative polarity are more rocks with positive polarity. This pattern continues on both sides of the mid-ocean ridge across the ocean basin. The pattern of magnetic polarity is one of the main lines of evidence for seafloor spreading, which is the mechanism for plate tectonics.
The geomagnetic reversal time scale has patterns of polarity. It is the pattern of alternating and reserved polarity in rocks.
Polar reversal, or geomagnetic reversal, happens on average every 450,000 years, though the range of time varies widely.There is a link to an article on geomagnetic reversal below.
Through geomagnetic reversal whee they studying the magnetic properties of the seafloor.
Yes Called geomagnetic reversal it happens once every few hundred thousand years and the next is due soon, apparently.
Scientists date sea-floor rocks by looking at patterns in the rocks, including magnetic patterns, and by looking at the geomagnetic reversal time scale.
No. The reversal of polarity is a reversal of Earth's magnetic poles. The Corilolis effect is a direct consequence of Earth's rotation and is not affected by the magnetic field.
Earth's magnetic field has no effect on its axial tilt.
2022
The Geomagnetic poles (dipole poles) are the intersections of the Earth's surface and the axis of a bar magnet hypothetically placed at the center the Earth by which we approximate the geomagnetic field. There is such a pole in each hemisphere, and the poles are called as "the geomagnetic north pole" and "the geomagnetic south pole", respectively. On the other hand, the magnetic poles are the points at which magnetic needles become vertical. There also are "the magnetic north pole" and "the magnetic south pole". The geomagnetic or magnetic south (north) poles correspond to the N (S) -pole of a magnet.
Lateral inversion is the reversal of an object when the image is formed in a flat mirror. This reversal is only in the direction perpendicular to the surface of the mirror. However, the effect is often seen by a person as a "left-right" reversal with the "front-back" reversal not noticed. That's the reason it's called lateral inversion. "Lateral" means sideways.
no one knows.
There has been a lot of confusion about this. It depends if your asking about a geomagnetic reversal, or the other on. It has been forseen that there may be a geomagnetic reversal some time in the very near future, namely 2012. I think this is very true. See the Mayan callender which ends in 2012, in December. Apparently a geomagnetic polar shift will bring calamatity and death to earth,