Waves cause wind, not vice versa
75% of the earth's surface is ocean. The sea is joined to the ocean. The surface of the water is in a frictional interface with the air, and air and sea currents go in the same direction. Mainstream science says this is because the winds came first, and act upon the sea. Their picture is of a still ocean surface, waiting to see what pressure differences the air generates to cause sea surface waves. But deep sea currents exist and science is slow to explain how far away surface flows induce deep sea currents.
Boaties know that a big blow stops at the turn of the tide. Why? Huge volumes of water flow through the earth’s oceans. If they are blown by wind it does not explain density and temperature gradients at least two kilometres beneath the sea surface and atmosphere. Climate alarmists claim that atmospheric heating, blowing, cooling and calming acting on the sea means CO2 emissions can change air and then sea, causing sea-levels to rise. But the only thing that can heat the ocean surface is the sun and the only thing that can drive ocean currents is the moon.
It is more logical that sea surface temperatures (SSTs) affect the behaviour of the adjacent atmosphere. Due to surface currents, winds form because they are juxtaposed to the ocean, and they flow over the interruptions of land masses, becoming the prevailing winds, the direction of which is an essential ingredient of the climate of a region. This directionality is caused by the ocean. Just as sound waves are produced by vibrating objects, ocean waves are produced by the oscillations of currents. Just as sound activates receivers through induced pressure differences in the receiver, sea waves cause pressure differences in the air which become wind.
Ocean currents are in charge, not winds. Currents increase or reduce temperatures depending on whether they flow from the equator or from the poles. Globally currents flow from poles to the equator, cold flowing to warm, yet atmospheric-engine-science claims that winds flow from warm to cold. This cannot be. Coastal areas are cooler and wetter than inland areas. Clouds form when warm air from inland meets cool air from the sea, which is why when we look out plane windows we see cloud bands along coastlines, fed continually from the sea.
The centres of continents are subject to a large range of temperatures. Winds blow from the cooler sea bringing rain to the coast and drier weather inland. The reason the interior of Australia is so dry is because it is beyond water sources and clouds do not travel far before dropping rain loads. For the inland deserts in summer, temperatures can be very hot and dry as moisture from the sea evaporates before it reaches the centre of the land mass.
Oceanic navigators who monitor SSTs know this to be a more reliable weather predictor than isobaric maps, because sea-level temperatures change before changes in air pressure, which gives warning of storms before they happen. SSTs within 6-degrees latitude of the equator warmed by the summer sun to 26°C -28°C over a wide ocean area cause tropical cyclones to form, because warmed air produces more evaporation. Heat from warmer water can significantly modify an air mass over 35-40 kilometres.
SSTs are not only indicators of developing cyclones, but also sea fog and sea breezes. Sea surface cooling is observed after the passing of a tropical cyclone, so mariners can predict when a bad system may be about to weaken. Slightly lower SSTs indicate breezy conditions, changing as calm approaches. On calmer days, SSTs can vary by up to 6°C.
Winds that accompany currents under the Australian Bight and which blow to NZ mix with low pressure fronts from the Southern Ocean and are cooler. The highs and lows of our weather system are carried along this westerly flow. Extreme and faster westerlies pass under us, the fact of which is a driving force of our climate. Our depressions (areas of low-pressure likely to cause clouds and rain) mostly develop in this westerly system.
Weather that comes down the Tasman Sea from north Queensland is warm and moist. It strikes the southern westerly flow and is deflected back up and over NZ, losing strength and dissipating to our northeast. Near the equator the winds are easterly or south-easterly, because the currents mostly flow from the east (La Nina) and only sometimes from the west (El Nino).
The main ocean current that affects the UK is the Gulf Stream, which brings warm equatorial water northwards. The current cold UK winter can be blamed on changes in ocean surface temperature. The moon, the source of sea current energy, was at its furthest point north, the northern declination on 19 March. After each lunar northern declination Arctic currents and polar winds descend. This time they coupled with apogee which slowed the currents giving them more time to cool.
Snowstorms result when bands of very cold air from the poles collide with warm air, which rises quickly and the cold air cuts underneath it. The sudden warmth causes huge cloud banks, leading to heavy snowfalls. The stronger the temperature decrease with height, the taller the clouds get, and the greater the precipitation rate. If temperatures get too high snowflakes melt as they fall, turning them into rain or sleet.
While the UK has more winter snow to come, Ireland is warmed more by the Gulf Stream and moves into milder spring temperatures when this April begins. Snows and frosts in NZ arrive when a perigeal winter moon is at or near southern declination. The first of these around 20 May brings the first heavy frosts to Canterbury. Good snowfalls should follow for the Central Plateau and the west and south of the South Island in the last week of May.
Ken Ring of www.predictweather.com is the author of the Weather Almanac for NZ for 2013 (published by Random House)
