THE POLESAs you can see, the southern pole is blessed with many poles: the magnetic pole, the geomagnetic pole and the geographic pole.
The easiest to describe is the True Geographic Pole, it's the point on the earth where you'd put the poll if the earth was a spinning top. The South Magnetic Pole is where on the surface the earth's magnetic field runs straight up. The point on Antarctica furthest from any ocean, so you would have to travel the most to get there setting out from the coast. It is poetically called the Pole of Inaccessibility despite being reached in 1958. There is even a Ceremonial Pole which consists of a red and white striped barber pole with a chromium ball on top. It was put at the Geographic Pole but the geographic pole is moving at 10 m a year and it has moved out since the ceremonial pole was put in place. |
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The Magnetic Pole and the Auroras
The earth's magnetic field is generated by the molten metal spinning at the earth core. this magnetic field protects us from the charged particles that continuously stream from the sun. Some of these charged particles are caught in the magnetic field and are channeled by the field above the north and south magnetic poles. When they do, the lights created by these charged particles interacting with the field are spectacular. Unfortunately we are too far north to see them in Melbourne but they are sometimes visible from Tasmania. The best view is from the international space station as seen in this footage. |