Waterworld: Weather, Wind & Waves

[olhippie]

Any weather experts or know-it-alls out there who can answer a hypothetical question. What would the weather,wind,waves ect. be like in a world with no or little land. As in the movie "waterworld"?

[boatman61]

Dunno about the weather or sea's...
but I'd love that tri... sailed and manouvered without wind a treat...

[joey69]

the wave/weather action is in direct relation to the gravitational forces of the moon and the axis of the earth at different times of the year.it probably wouldn't be much different than what we have now.

[SurferShane]

Opps, just know I was at a friends place last night and she mentioned how the previous night she attempted to watch this movie. Like the many attempts I have had she also fell asleep before the end. From what she said though I might get a bit of inspiration from Kevin's boat?

On the original question I am wondering if the fact the basic weather pattern in the Northern hemisphere is mirrored in the south even though the south has less concentrated land mass is an indication there would still be wind in Waterworld?

[joey69]

yes.you still would have heat rising from warm waters that causes the colder air to rush in,which is how/where the wind is created.

[joey69]

When you have a large enough area of warm water that can continuously pull in cold air over a period of days,you get hurricanes.Over land you get thunderstorms that create tornadoes,but when the sun goes down the land usually cools down fast enough that tornadoes quickly lose their strength.

[SurferShane]

Originally Posted by joey69

yes.you still would have heat rising from warm waters that causes the colder air to rush in,which is how/where the wind is created.

And the warm waters would still be around the equator where the suns ray's have their fullest effect?

[joey69]

The Sun, in its seasonal apparent movement across the sky, passes directly over the Equator twice each year, at the March and September equinoxes.

Equator - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Adelie]

It would be beyond prediction without resorting to heavy duty computer simulations, and even then the results would be pretty iffy.

The big problem is that a lot of the oceanic current heat transport mechanisms would be affected since the underwater topography would have changed a fair bit, places that were land and couldn't transport water and heat now could.

The cycles that involve airborne heat transport between land and sea areas would be completely disrupted. Take for instance the monsoons, as wikipedia describes them they are 'seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with the asymmetric heating of land and sea.' ( Monsoon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia )

You may ask what does heat transport have to do with the weather? It has everything to do with the weather, the difference in temperature between various locations on the surface of the earth provides the energy to drive winds, and related temperature and pressure changes lead to rain.

Even now the best models running on the really big computers are only good for predicting 48hr or so in advance and that is after decades of refinement, coparing predictions to actual weather in order to find refinements.

[joey69]

yes,i believe there would hardly be any of the under water currents like we have now.with no land it would be mostly atmospheric changes in temperature that would create the winds.