Geography [2 Mark Question Answer]

When the gravitational forces of the sun and the moon work together to attract the earth due to being in a straight line, high tides or Spring tides are caused. When the sun and the moon are in the right angle with respect to the earth, Neap tides or low tides are caused.

The amount of salinity in the oceans in different parts is quite different. So the more saline water starts to sink downwards and the less saline water runs to take its place on the surface, e.g., the ocean current flows from the Atlantic ocean towards the Mediterranean sea.

The earth rotates from west to east. So, according to the First Law of Motion, the ocean currents start to flow from east to west in the opposite direction, e.g. the North and South Equatorial currents flow from east to west.

A high amount of evaporation increases the salinity of oceanic water and excess of precipitation makes water less saline. So the heavy saline water sinks down and the lighter water flows towards it to take its place as an ocean current.

Waves are the oscillatory (to and from) movements in the oceanic water, but tides are the particular turbulent motion of the oceanic water due to gravitational forces (centrifugal and centripetal) working together with the earth and the moon which makes the waves of the ocean jumping up to several metres resulting in a typical phenomenon of violent waves i.e. tides.

Oyashio Current is a cold current colliding with warm Kuroshio current along the eastern coast of Japan. It originates in the Arctic ocean and passes through the Bering strait proceeding towards the south.

Labrador Current originates from the Arctic Ocean along the coast of Labrador and passes touching Newfoundland continuing southwards along the coast of Nova Scotia. It is joined by West Greenland and Baffin Island Current. It meets the warm Gulf Stream Current at the Grand Banks, making this region the famous fishing bank.

Ocean currents are warm and cold according to the temperature. Ocean currents are caused by the rotation of the earth, the force of prevailing winds, amount of salinity and the presence of the continental ejections, etc.

Queensland’s coast is touched by the warm East Australian current and gets heavy rainfall by trade winds from the sea towards land, but Atacama desert is touched by cold Peruvian current and the westerlies blowing from land towards sea make the Atacama the cold driest desert in the world.