Last Thursday I had some errands to do in the afternoon, and when I drove down to the harbor at the end of our street I could not believe how low the water was! So I drove to the beach where we have Dunkin' Donuts each week, and couldn't believe my eyes! In this photograph, we sit on the beach to the left of the last line of tidal debris in the distance! Hight tide comes to where the footprints are. Look how far the water is to the right!
It felt as if half the harbor had been drained! So I grabbed my camera and did all kinds of photographs trying to show how far the tide was out. The first thing I saw was was the sandbar way over to the left. That looks as if it is half way across the harbor! And normally, at low tide, we do not see this dark area where I am standing - it is always underwater. Fortunately, I know what the explanation is for the low tide. It is full Moon so the Moon is lined up with the Earth and the Sun, thus having a greater effect on the tides. But the larger force was the wind. The wind had been howling after a frontal passage, and it was blowing from the west at 30 to 40 MPH. When the tide goes out, the water in Long Island Sound drains to the east of Long Island. Whe the tide started to come back in, it was facing these howling winds, and the wind kept the water from coming back down the sound to the west. Thus, one of the lowest tides I have ever seen and photographed since we have lived here! What a wonderful and amazing place I live, where I can see things like this. PLEASE click on this lower panoramic image and you can see it much larger and with so much more detail!
3 comments:
I always thought that a full moon made high tide higher than normal. Living near the sound is ever changing. Amazing to think you have lived in the same home for so many years and this is the lowest tide you have witnessed. Joan
Seems shocking to see the sandbar so far to the left in the harbor. Betsey
Joan: The way the moon affects the tides, is to think of the Moon as a magnet. When a magnet is close to a piece of metal it has a greater effect on it. Eurther away, it has less effect. So when the Moon is closer, the high tides are higher and the low tides are lower. When the Moon is further away, the high tides are jot as high and the low tides are not as low.. Hope this makes it more understandable.
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