What If The Earth Stopped Spinning?

Hey, Vsauce. Michael here. The Earth is spinning and we are spinning along with it.

But what if the Earth suddenly stopped spinning?

Well, first of all, you would gain weight.

But that would be the least of your worries.

The spin of our planet is important and literally giving you the time of your life.

At the equator, the surface of Earth and everything on it is spinning around at

465 meters a second. As you move closer to the poles,

you don't have to move as quickly to complete Earth's daily rotation.

Here in San Francisco, the Earth is driving me east at 368 meters per second.

If I could float above the surface independent of the Earth's rotation,

the Earth would spin underneath me this quickly. Pretty cool.

But of course, when I jump straight up into the air,

the Earth doesn't move underneath me because I continue to spin with it.

We are all spinning with the Earth and that is why slamming on a set of magical planetary brakes

that caused everything classically called Earth to stop spinning would be catastrophic.

Immediately, everything that wasn't Earth and wasn't safely at the poles would continue moving as it had been

and be flung due east at more than a thousand miles an hour.

You wouldn't be flung into space because escape velocity is 24,800 miles per hour,