One of the most difficult #friendlywaves I’ve ever gotten! Did I get it right?
Florian sent me a #friendlywave — a wave picture he took, with hopes that I might be able to explain what is going on there. And this one had me puzzled…
Tag: breaking waves
Such a pretty #friendlywaves!
My long time Twitter friend Anne shared these beautiful pictures and I absolutely had to do a #friendlywaves post where I explain other people’s wave pictures. Take a moment to admire…
A beautiful #friendlywaves from Spain
A reader of my blog, Rocío*, sent me this beautiful image from Arnao beach (Castrillón- Asturias-Spain), and I asked if I could use it in a #friendlywaves post. He agreed, so…
A #friendlywaves from Cyprus
My friend Alice (of the awesome Instagram @scied_alice and the equally awesome blog, which you should totally follow) sent me a #friendlywaves from her trip to Cyprus. She said that this was a…
Same beach, different waves. Why?
Here is a puzzle for you. Walking along a beach, first, the waves looked like this: One wave breaking at a time. That’s the situation you also see in the…
Wave watching: Refraction and diffraction of waves
A little more wave watching, today with a focus on how waves change direction when they run into shallow water. Let’s look at this beautiful wave and see what happens when…
Waves break when they reach a critical steepness
You can quite accurately predict when a wave is going to break. When it will break depends on its steepness, which depends on the slope that it is running up…
Types of breaking waves depending on steepness of slope – small scale
Video of different types of breakers – small scale. In this recent post we talked about types of breakers depending on the steepness of the slope. But even on a…
Waves breaking depending on steepness of the slope
Waves breaking on slopes of different steepnesses. Depending on a slope’s steepness, waves can break in very different ways. On nearly horizontal beaches, spilling breakers develop. On steeper beaches, plunging…
Internal waves in the atmosphere
A photo of internal waves in the atmosphere. Internal waves exist on the interface between fluids of different densities. In the ocean they are mostly observed through their surface imprint.…