Don’t start running around like your hair’s on fire, but this might actually matter. The Earth’s magnetic field is so discombobulated over South Africa that some scientists believe we’re seeing the opening strains of a planet-wide polarity change.

“Such a major change would affect our navigation systems,” according to two geophysicists from the University of Rochester, “as well as the transmission of electricity. The spectacle of the northern lights might appear at different latitudes. And because more radiation would reach Earth’s surface under very low field strengths during a global reversal, it also might affect rates of cancer.”

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