The major runways at King County International Airport, Washington, have re-marked the entirety: the lane previously designated 13R is now designated 14R, and the lane previously designated 31L is now designated 32L.
The sensational news went completely unnoticed by the American and other media, but in vain.
For anyone, except for dispatchers and pilots, the designation of the lane does not carry any semantic meaning, so we explain.
The designations of the take-off and landing (as well as its corresponding markings) depend on the so-called magnetic course along which the landing aircraft enters the runway. The magnetic heading is the angle between the north direction of the magnetic meridian passing through the aircraft and the longitudinal axis of the aircraft.
All runways (runways) of aerodromes necessarily have a so-called end face identifier - a marked number that is associated with the magnetic heading of the runway (Magnetic Heading).
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Thus, if the runway end face identifiers have changed, then their magnetic headings have also changed. This suggests that the North Magnetic Pole has already moved more than tangibly and corrections are in full swing at the airfields.
According to NASA, the magnetic north pole has moved more than 600 miles since the early 19th century, averaging 3 miles per year. However, the magnetic north pole is currently migrating at a speed of 64 kilometers per year. It remains only to guess how much the movement will accelerate further and when, at least, the magnetic poles will roll.