The Magnetic North Pole Has Officially Changed Position

It's time to recalibrate the navigation systems on ships, airplanes, and (given the time of year) Santa's sleigh: the position of the magnetic North Pole is officially being changed, continuing its shift away from Canada and towards Siberia.

Experts from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the British Geological Survey (BGS) have joined forces – as they do every five years – to produce a new, more accurate World Magnetic Model (WMM).

While the geographical North Pole stays fixed in place (at the very summit of the Earth's rotational axis), the WMM pinpoints the magnetic North Pole – where Earth's magnetic field points straight down, a perfectly vertical magnetic field.

And as the iron and nickel inside our planet shift, so does Earth's magnetic field, meaning the North (and South) Poles are also constantly on the move. If you're using a compass or a GPS system, knowing exactly where these points are is crucial.

"The current behaviour of magnetic north is something that we have never observed before," says global geomagnetic field modeller William Brown, from BGS.

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