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Saw "White Squall" yesterday--$.99 rental and the best bargain I've seen in a long time.
When the skipper is being tried for lack of judgment, either a witness or an attorney argues that the white squall's existence at all is probably apocryphal--something not proven to be a natural phenomenon. Does anyone know anything more about this?
The way the filmmakers showed the white squall was as a sort of huge, white rising wave of a curtain of madly falling water--it looked like a waterfall hitting the ship.
Something else that was explained that was news to me was the definition of a loose cannon--there was a boy who was causing trouble and the term was being implicitly applied to him. Anyway, here's what the skipper said about the loose cannon:
"You know what a loose cannon is? A couple of thousand pounds of pigiron crashing around on deck"...putting holes into everything.
The boy who records the story, when they arrive at the Galapagos Islands, I believe, says they "saw the bliss of nature in the absence of man," which was the single best contemporary comment made in the story. I use "contemporary" here because Shakespeare, Donne and other classic writers are also quoted throughout by an English teacher.
Finally, there's a shot of the ship going under--she appears to be completely submerged--but then she rolls back up out of the ocean.
Anyway, if you missed this one, it's worth taking a look at. I cried at the end--so, if you like tearjerkers and are sensitive, you may shed a little tear.
Best regards,
DubDub
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old hand
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Well, I got a degree in the subject in 1980 but the old brain's a bit foggy these days...
To be frank Bean is the best qualified - doing her PhD in oceanography. I hear she's a bit busy at the moment so that's maybe why she hasn't chimed in to set us all straight.....
In her absence, I think Keiva and of troy make pretty good stand in oceanographers.... Both sorted out the matters of fetch and berms pretty well I thought. Fetch (the distance the prevailing wind travels over water) is one of the components that contributes to wave height - along with a few others that I've forgotten - but which include the depth of the water and the slope of the coast as I recall.
The sill depth is (I think) the depth to the continental shelf (help Bean!)
Noone seems to have mentioned cusps yet. These are the seaward pointing "horns" at each end of a berm - they point to where the rips are generally operating offshore. Both are features of a beach's winter profile - more wave activity in winter, steeper beaches, greater cusp and berm development.
Keiva was also correct to push for berm being a generic term, not necessarily for exclusive maritime use. Frinstance, there are berms in open pit mines. In this context however, their counterparts are not cusps but batters. The batters are the steep parts of the pit wall that link a series of horizontal batters.
stales
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Carpal Tunnel
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Thank you, milum. Fascinating! I now know what I'm going to be doing all this afternoon.
[rushing off to find that book -e]
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Making an educated guess.......
Im guessing we were talking warm waters?
If so, then I think we're onto something - gases dissolve more easily in warmer water. A change in atmospheric pressure (from high/er to low/er) could theoretically result in the phenomenon you mention. Just as when you open a bottle of soda, the bubbles come out.
If so, I'm betting it was carbon dioxide (just like soda and champagne) - particularly as you didn't mention whether there was a smell present.
CO2 (or any of several other gases) is given off by volcanic action as well, so it may have been a crustal source of gas bubbling up through the ocean.
A last guess is that it may have been oxygen being given off from an unusually high concentration of algae.....
(I can't sign off without asking whether you and your bathing colleagues had previously eaten a few batches of spicey Costa Rican food?? There again, you didn't mention any smell did you....)
Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
stales
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Carpal Tunnel
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(I can't sign off without asking whether you and your bathing colleagues had previously eaten a few batches of spicey Costa Rican food?? There again, you didn't mention any smell did you....)
Well, of course we were eating spicy food, but, that t'wernt it. No smell. TINY bubbles! Montezuma is at the southernmost tip of the Nicoya penninsula, Pacific side of Costa Rica. There are several seperate beaches, Montezuma beach, Sano Banano beach, Red Rock Beach, Long beach(that of the bubbles) and the Black Sand beach. It is my understanding that the Nicoya penninsula was formed by a lava floe. My guess is there is some type of gas (prolly CO2) escaping through the sand in that one area that causes the bubbles. I just wanted to know if any of youse guys that actually know about these things might agree with my theory. (still looking for the perfect pic link but have to leave for pottery. This spot saved)
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Carpal Tunnel
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WW:
Having spent some time in the sH, and having lived in the NH the rest of my life, I can double damned assure you that the water in the toilets in the Southern Hemisphere goes the same way as does the water in the Northern Hemisphere: down.
TEd --flush with victory for having been the only one to get it right!
TEd
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DOWN UNDER: SOLVEDIt's a well know fact that we's mates from down under make up seven per cent of the world's population, and yet raise thirty-eight per cent of the world's cain. One such cain they raise is that it is we, not they, who live near the bottom of the earth. Ha ha ha. This morning I devised a simple experiment that you can do at home that proves... (a) Einstein was right about relativity. (b) The duel nature of the coriolis force. [c] That Aussies and Zealies live down under. OK, Everybody ready? OK, Now stand up and... 1)Raise your right hand towards the ceiling. 2)Now with your arm fully extended point your index finger back towards the top of your head. 3)Now start rotating your finger in a counter-clockwise circle. 4)Slowly rotate your helicopter finger down the front of your body down to your crotch. 5)Now say... "Tan me hide, Mate, when me blooming 'copter passes me equator belt and gets to me bottom, it changes direction and circles clockwise! Ha ha ha. Boil me in Kangaroo oil, We live in a land down under after all." 
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
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Ha ha ha. Boil me in Kangaroo oil, We live in a land down under after all."
Is the operative word here "live"?
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While we have our feet wet.. can some one explain to me again, (i promise this time i'll master it!) the rule of 12?
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It is indeed all about the volume of water that flows between tides.
Basically, you have six hours between high and low tide (or between low and high tide whichever way you look at it).
In the first hour 1/12 of the total volume of water that's going to flow in/out will flow.
In the second it will be 2/12
In the third, 3/12
In the fourth, 3/12
In the fifth, 2/12
In the sixth, 1/12
So the flow of the tide is always fastest in the middle two hours of the cycle because that's when the biggest volume of water is travelling.
That pretty much applies wherever you are in the world, unless you're somewhere like Poole Harbour which has really unusual tides because it has two highs and two lows in each cycle instead of just one, but that gets really complicated!
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Carpal Tunnel
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explain ... the rule of 12?
Well, it's sinusoidal, innit?
Think of a point on a circle, moving around the circle at a constant speed. Now think of looking at that circle from one side. The circle will appear as a line and the apparent speed of the point is going to be slow when it's near the ends of the line and fast when it's near the center.
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