SGR 1900+14 had a brief episode of exceedingly rapid spindown immediately following its 1998 Aug. 27 superburst .
On a timescale of hours , it increased its period by a part in 10 ^ { 4 } .
The corresponding \dot { P } \sim 10 ^ { -8 } is orders of magnitude higher than the typical quiescent rate of \dot { P } \sim 6 \times 10 ^ { -11 } .