Quake may have altered Earth's rotation

Asia's deadly earthquake may have accelerated the Earth's rotation and caused the planet to wobble on its axis, U.S. scientists say.
Tsunami victims reach world via Net

The story "Quake may have altered Earth's rotation" published December 28, 2004 at 6:10 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

Content from Reuters expires after 30 days.

Earth's rotation altered

Since the size of the earthquake altered the earths roatation by nanoseconds, what size earthquake or quakes would it take to reverse the eaths rotation and what would the global effects be? Sounds farfetched, I know but run with this. I am not a paranoid person. But what ifs have gotten the world to be what it is.

thatnk you.

[Steven N]

Physics...

The only thing that could reverse the spin of earth would be an impact of some sort of meteor or even another planet. Just think of a billiards ball. It is spinning around, and you want to change the direction of the spin without touching it. You can only throw things agains it.
Needless to say an event like that would destroy the globe...

What is said here is something different. The quake caused a change in the mass distribution of earth, that causes an increase in the rotation speed. It is similar to a iceskater in a spin that is retracting his/her arms. It will cause him/her to spin faster. However on eath the relative change causes by the quake is very small. I 've read reports of 20 cm. Compared to the radius of eath this is a very small change, so that is why they are mentioning milliseconds.