Tides

1a) The earth will experience 2 high tides and 2 low tides in one day. It takes 6 hours to go from a high-tide to a low-tide, and 12 hours to get back to the high-tide. This is all because of the moon and the sun. The moon makes one full rotation around the earth each day. This means that it is in line with the sun and the earth two times, and it is at a 90º angle to the sun two times. This placement of the moon creates our tides.

b) There is a difference in force felt by each side of the earth. The side closer to the sun will experience a much stronger force, while the side opposite from the sun will experience a much smaller force. Still, the tides will be the same on each opposing side of the earth.

c) The tides are still the same on each side of the earth even though they have different forces. At a high-tide the earths ocean are being pulled on strongly on one side, and on the other there is a much smaller pull. Therefore, one side will rise because of the strong force upon it and the other side will rise because there is little force on it which counter-acts the stronger pull.

d) A Spring tide occurs when the gradational pull of the moon and the sun are combined. This creates very high high-tides and very low low-tides. There can be either a full moon or a new moon during Spring tides. A Neap tide occurs when the sun and moon forces are perpendicular to one another, cancelling each other out. Neap tides result in a smaller difference between high-tides and low-tides. Neap tides occur during quarter moons.

2a) At roughly 7:30 on Friday evening (14th) Nassau is experiencing a low tide.

b) About a week ago (5th, 6th, 7th) Nassau would have been experiencing Spring tides because there was a full moon. Now however, Nassau is somewhere in between because there is a half moon. When it reaches a quarter, it will be experiencing Neap tides.