Oct 21, 2014 10:58 AM EDT By Russell Westerholm, UniversityHerald Reporter

Throughout the Earth's history, the planet's magnetic poles have undergone 180-degree flips and the next one could happen in a person's lifetime.

According to LiveScience, the last one occurred some 800,000 years ago at a time when the magnetic North was on Antarctica. Past studies have suggested the flipping process takes thousands of years, but new analysis says the last one may have been as short as 100 years.

Published in Geophysical Journal International, the new study examines data gathered by a European Space Agency (ESA) satellite over the summer. Analysis suggests that the Earth's magnetic field is weakening much faster than previous studies have estimated and that the next flip may be a couple thousand years away.

"It's amazing how rapidly we see that reversal," study co-author Courtney Sprain, a graduate student at the University of California - Berkeley, said in a press release. "The paleomagnetic data are very well done. This is one of the best records we have so far of what happens during a reversal and how quickly these reversals can happen."

A magnetic field flip is not typically associated with natural disasters, but such an event could tear down the Earth's electrical grid. Since the magnetic field also helps protect humans from the sun's cosmic rays, the rate of cancer on Earth could also spike.

"What's incredible is that you go from reverse polarity to a field that is normal with essentially nothing in between, which means it had to have happened very quickly, probably in less than 100 years," study co-author Paul Renne, director of the Berkeley Geochronology Center and a UC Berkeley professor, said in the release. "We don't know whether the next reversal will occur as suddenly as this one did, but we also don't know that it won't."

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