If not for my usual laziness, I would have written about this years ago. But after reading the latest “scientific explanation” of the phenomena, I just couldn’t keep silence anymore. So, here’s my view on the forces that seem to be more likely culprits of the moving rocks phenomenon than the now commonly accepted “light breeze”.

Anyway, for those who doesn’t know what this is about: there is this place in California (mostly in California anyway), apparently, the hottest, driest and lowest place in the US, called “Death Valley” (but you already know that, right?), and, in certain flat field in that area, there are some rocks scattered on the field, some are pretty heavy, more than 300 kg (folks who are still confused by metric system: it’s more than 660 lb), which (the rocks) apparently move time to time, as it seems “by themselves”. Here’s a photo which shows the rocks and the tracks they left (image stolen from some random Internet site, apologies if I violate somebody’s copyright; just let me know and I’ll remove your image and make somebody else famous):

Anyway, the movement was actually caught on a time-lapse camera, as you can see on this site. And the latest and greatest scientific explanation can be found on that same site, which apparently claims that the rocks are moved by a light breeze, or a wind with a speed of 3 – 5 m/sec… Really? Like that’s the strongest force applied to the rocks or ice sheets or whatever there? I prey you put 300 kg rock on a level ground (dried mud), add some water, freeze it, slightly melt the ice, then lightly blow on the rock with your mouth. I’m not kidding, when you just exhale air while breathing normally, the air comes out with the speed of about  1 – 2 m/sec, blowing lightly will easily triple that. And, yes, I realize that the air should apply with the same force to the entire surface of the side of the rock, so you can ask one or two friends to join you. That should be enough: an average 300 kg rock is not that big (e.g. for granite, a 300 kg cube will have a 47.8 cm sides and most of the rocks have more aerodynamic shapes than a cube). Note, that the rocks leave deep tracks on the mud, they are not ON the ice sheets. Do you really believe that you can cause those rocks move THROUGH that mud with your breath?

No, seriously, I think there are much stronger forces in play during the day. I’m talking about gravity. To me it seems much more likely that the same gravity that holds those rocks in place, moves them just like it moves the tides in the ocean. Of course, for this to happen, you need the condition to be really slippery, like ice and/or mud, but the pulling force is gravity, the earth’s gravity for that matter (no, no, I’m not confused, just keep reading). In simple words: the rocks slide down the slope. And the slope constantly changes, even reverses during the day. Let me explain.

You probably know that tides are caused by the moon and the sun pulling on water. Mostly. But the water is not the only thing that can be pulled and displaced by external gravity. There is stuff in the earth, about 4,990 times heavier than all the water in all the oceans, namely: the mantle and the earth’s core, which constitute 99.8% of the earth’s mass. This stuff is either liquid or semi-liquid (better known as magma), or floats inside the magma like a yolk in an egg-white. What I’m saying is: all those 99.8% of the earth are pulled by the moon and the sun constantly stretching the earth, changing its shape, causing it to bulge in one place, depress in the other, and even making the core wobble inside the earth, changing the effective earth’s gravitation on the surface, affecting tides and moving stuff which doesn’t have enough friction to stay in place, just like rocks in Death Valley when the surface is really slippery.

And, by the way, I’m not making this up, this is called “Earth Tide”, and is well known in scientific community. The Earth Tide affects volcanic activities and some geologists found strong correlation between times when the earthquakes strike and the times of the day when the gravitational pull from the moon and the sun is at it’s maximum*.

Like I said before: effectively the rocks slide down the slope. That’s why they all move in the same direction. And the slope changes over time, causing the rocks to move all together in a new direction.

 

*My friend Armen Kazarian, who made that discovery, is too lazy to publish his book on the Internet, so there is no link right now. I promise to add one, when he finally puts something on the web.