Mondo Knows Facts
Tides come in pairs because of stretching
The Moon pulls hardest on the near side, and the resulting imbalance bulges the far side too Gravity weakens with distance, so the Moon pulls the near ocean more strongly than the solid Earth, and the far ocean less. The difference produces two bulges, which is why most coasts get two high tides a day. The Sun adds a smaller effect, and when the two align the range grows into spring tides. It sits in Mondo's world geography collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
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Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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More facts like this
Spring tides have nothing to do with the seasonThe name comes from the old sense of springing upward, and the tides happen twice a monthSome ocean points have almost no tide at allAt an amphidromic point the tidal range collapses to near zero while water rotates around itThe Moon is slowly drifting away from EarthLuni-solar tidal friction pushes the Moon outward by roughly four centimetres each yearThe Moon is slowing Earth's spinTidal friction lengthens the day by a couple of milliseconds a centuryTidal range depends on the shape of the coastFunnelling estuaries amplify the tide while open shores and enclosed seas barely moveThe Bay of Fundy tide arrives as a waveIn the upper reaches the rising water forms a visible bore that travels upriver
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Tags: tides, moon, oceans
Tides come in pairs because of stretching: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- The Moon pulls hardest on the near side, and the resulting imbalance bulges the far side too. The figure is taken from NOAA Ocean Service, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a world geography fact?
- Yes. It sits on the World Geography shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.