[Repeal The 17th]

Of all the runways, at all of the airports, all over the world...
the magnetic shift has resulted in re-designation of just this one?

[Professional Engineer]

Of all the runways, at all of the airports, all over the world... the magnetic shift has resulted in re-designation of just this one?

THis is because every other runway on the planet was installed on vertical pivots to keep up with magnetic drift. Why do you think airports are so large geographically? So the runways can swing about freely.

[Erasmus]

17th: Of all the runways, at all of the airports, all over the world... the magnetic shift has resulted in re-designation of just this one?

The story talks only about this one, but it's been happening at others, and the trend will accelerate.

bboop: Of all the runways, at all of the airports, all over the world... the magnetic shift has resulted in re-designation of just this one?

See above.

By way of further explanation, the strength of the geomagnetic field is decreasing globally. Geophysicists speculate that we are entering a transition period that will eventually result in another pole reversal. (How soon they expect this, I don't recall.)

During a transition such as the present one, the overall decrease in field strength leads to an exaggeration in regional variations. This also leads to (comparatively) rapid shifts in the position of the poles, and to the acceleration of shifts in the local declinations.

It makes for an increasingly disordered map of said declinations.