Where Is the North Pole Located?
Where is the North Pole located? There are actually two north poles. When most people say “North Pole” they are referring to the geographic North Pole, which is located at the point of rotation on the earth’s axis. The North magnetic pole is where the earth’s magnetic field lines dip vertically into the earth. These two north poles are the clues to finding the North Pole.
The North Pole is located at the exact spot where the earth spins on its axis. This is the geographic North Pole, or the terrestrial North Pole. When people say, “true north” they are referring to this pole. It is at 90 degrees North latitude and all directions from it are south. It is also the convergence of all the lines of longitude.
However, the North Pole is not always located in the exact same spot due to the fact that the earth wobbles a bit. Since there is no fixed point for the North Pole, its location, when determined, is called the “instantaneous pole." This difference is only a few meters, nine to be exact, and is called the "Chandler Wobble" after the person who discovered it in 1891, Seth Carlo Chandler.
Another answer to the question of where the North Pole is located could be, “It is in the Arctic Ocean.” The South Pole is on a land mass, but the North Pole is on water. The Arctic waters are covered with sea ice which is unstable, so a permanent marker cannot be built. The sea ice is between two and three metres thick. The depth of the water is 13,980 feet or 4261 metres.
Weather at the North Pole
Night and day is interesting at the North Pole. In the summer, the sun shines all the time and in the winter, the sun is not seen. It rises right before the vernal equinox and sets right after the autumnal equinox. That’s alright because no one lives there and all the time zones converge there.
The North Pole is warmer than the South Pole because it is on an ocean and at sea level, whereas the South Pole is on a land mass and not at sea level. Temperatures average between −34 degrees C in the winter to 0 degrees C in the summer, or -29 degrees F to 32 degrees F.
North Magnetic Pole
Five centuries ago, seafaring men thought that there was a magnetic mountain in the north that attracted their compasses. Later, William Gilbert suggested that the earth itself was a magnet and he said a magnetized needle would stand vertically at the north and south magnetic poles.
By the 19th century, explorers had discovered that the North Magnetic Pole was not in the same location as the Geographic North Pole. The Magnetic North Pole was found by James Clark Ross in 1831 when his compass dipped at 89 degrees 59 minutes.
In the 1900s, the North Magnetic Pole’s position was charted several times. It has now been determined that the pole is moving in a northwesterly direction. In 2005, the North Magnetic Pole’s position was 81.3 degrees North and 110.8 degrees West. The North Magnetic Pole wanders daily and is sometimes up to 80 kilometres away if the earth’s magnetic filed is disturbed. It is moving about 10 kilometres a year.
The earth’s North and South Magnetic Poles are sometimes called the Magnetic Dip Poles because of the compass dip at their site. Because the magnetic field is not symmetrical, the poles are not antipodal, which means if you connected the two with a line it would not pass through the center of the earth.
Magnetism is created on the earth by electrical currents in the outer core. Since you know that opposites attract, as least with magnets, then the Magnetic North Pole is physically a magnetic field south pole.