Whirlpool
From Wikinfo
For the appliance maker by this name, see Whirlpool (company) . This is also the name of a cryptographic hash algorithm.
A whirlpool is a large, swirling body of water produced by ocean tides. In popular imagination, but only rarely in reality they can have the dangerous effects of destroying boats. The vast majority are not very powerful. More powerful ones are more properly termed maelstroms. Vortex is the proper term for any whirlpools that has a downdraft.
Very small whirlpools can be easily seen when a bath or a sink is draining, but these are produced in a very different manner from those in nature. Smaller whirlpools also appear at the base of many waterfalls. In the case of powerful ones like Niagara Falls these whirlpools can be quite potent.
The most powerful whirlpools are created in narrow shallow straights with fast flowing water. The Moskstraumen off the Loften islands in Norway is generally considered the world's most powerful whirlpool, but some claim the Old Sow is stronger. Powerful whirlpools have killed unlucky seafarers, but their power tends to be exaggerated in fiction. There are virtually no stories of large ships ever being sucked into a whirlpool. Tales like those by Jules Verne and Edgar Allan Poe are wholly made up.
Famous Whirlpools
- Corryvreckan off Scotland
- Moskstraumen off Norway
- Saltstraumen off Norway
- Old Sow between New Brunswick and Maine
- Naruto off Japan
- Garofalo off Italy
- Charybdis fictional from the Odyssey
The Icelandic Whirlpool is a massive flow of water that spins around Iceland and plays an important role in creating the climate of the North Atlantic
External Links
References
- Adapted from the Wikipedia article, "Whirlpool" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whirlpool, used under the GNU Free Documentation License
