Climate change is affecting the rotation of the Earth. The redistribution of now liquid frozen masses would be slowing the planet's spin on its axis.

The alteration will affect the synchrony between astronomical time and that marked by atomic clocks. By 2029, the time scale generally used will require, according to current rules, that a minute lasts only 59 seconds, says geophysicist Duncan Agnew of the University of California in San Diego. “This has never happened before and poses a huge challenge to ensuring that all parts of the global timing infrastructure show the same time,” he adds.