Just got some news from Dicky. I love hearing from him, and feel completely ripped off that he's there, while I'm, well, here.
Anyway, we would have learned about the Coriolis Effect in high-school together, probably in the same class, and now he's seen it on the Equator.
Both ways you say? Fascinating. :)
John.
p.s. I distinctly remember my teachers telling me it went “straight down“.
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well i´m actually trying to do a bit of work for uni at the moment, so thought it´d be a good time to procrastinate with all the exciting news of the week(s).
have now reached Ecuador - was starting to think that spending two months without changing country was just getting a bit too much! well, not really, but the weather in the mountains was starting to get a bit consistently worse, so i headed for the beach, (and now i´m back in the mountains).
so, i went up a couple more peaks in the cordillera blanca, soloed a nice one, then went up to a big 6000er with a couple of other guys...had some interesting experiences trying to climb a fixed ladder, then stumbled our way up the rest of it in a whiteout. that was a really good idea, because when we got down that night, we realised that our eyes, were well, kind of painful, and the next several days we had some nice funny blurry vision...hmmm...
so maybe that helped me decide to leave peru...spent some time at the beach, and at some old ruins. and now i´m in a different hemisphere...actually had the exciting experience today of standing right on the equator...and watched the water swirl one way to the left, and swirl the other on the right...absolutely fascinating...
there´s not much else interesting, so that´s about it. planning on doing a bit of volunteer work for the next month or so i think. then it will probably be adiós to south america! (dependent on sudden changes of plans that are likely to happen every 2weeks.. :)
anyhow, hope everyone is well!
Richard
yeah, it actually went straight down right on the equator...but then to the side, there was a bit of swirling action...
here´s a question for you...
the coriolis effect would be bigger further from the equator right?
and, when they spent so much effort trying to find the equator, why didn´t they just walk around with a bucket of water to put down a drain?
even in equador, there is a fake equator...nice and touristy, about 200m from this one we went to...surely they could have done the water trick, before they went to so much effort building all the tourist stuff at the wrong spot?
Heh. I bet that angular momentum really fucks with you on the poles.. you'll have to adventure to the north pole dicky, and let me know what happens there.. :)
Great idea by the way. Is it really so precise that 200m makes a difference? Or are you taking the micky out of me..? :P
John.
As for your question.. the coriolis effect is about change in angular momentum. I doubt it makes a difference what part of a sphere you're moving across, because you're moving over the same type of arc (i.e. the gradient is changing at the same rate). So, I'd guess not, except for the fact that the earth isn't quite spherical..
Am I wrong..?
John.
Angular momentum would be the greatest at the poles.. but the 'change' in angular momentum would be relatively constant, wouldn't it..?
I don't know. It's been years...
Also, what consitutes 'down' for the cross section of a similarly sized object when placed at a different point on a sphere would allow for less movement through different angular momentums.. if that makes sense.
I.e. a toilet toward the equator might span x degrees, while one toward the poles might span x/2 degrees, from one edge of the toilet to the other. So water pulled into a low pressure system can't move through such a great degree of 'changed angular momentum' at the poles..
I give up.. hehe. :P
John.