The Sewerage of Sea Coast Towns by Adams, Henry C., 1873-1952

About one-third of the surface of the globe is occupied by land, and the remaining two-thirds by water. The latter, being a mobile substance, is affected by this pull, which results in a banking up of the water in the form of the crest of a tidal wave. It has been asserted in recent years that this tidal action also takes place in a similar manner in the crust of the earth, though in a lesser degree, resulting in a heaving up and down amounting to one foot; but we are only concerned with the action of the sea at present. Now, although this pull is felt in all seas, it is only in the Southern Ocean that a sufficient expanse of water exists for the tidal action to be fully developed. This ocean has an average width of 1,500 miles, and completely encircles the earth on a circumferential line 13,500 miles long; in it the attraction of the sun and moon raises the water nearest to the centre of attraction into a crest which forms high water at that place. At the same time, the water is acted on by the centripetal effect of gravity, which, tending to draw it as near as possible to the centre of the earth, acts in opposition to the attraction of the sun and moon, so that at the sides of the earth 90 degrees away, where the attraction of the sun and moon is less, the centripetal force has more effect, and the water is drawn so as to form the trough of the wave, or low water, at those points. There is also the centrifugal force contained in the revolving globe, which has an equatorial diameter of about 8,000 miles and a circumference of 25,132 miles. As it takes 23 hr. 56 min 4 sec, or, say, twenty-four hours, to make a complete revolution, the surface at the equator travels at a speed of approximately 25,132/24 = 1,047 miles per hour. This centrifugal force is always constant, and tends to throw the water off from the surface of the globe in opposition to the centripetal force, which tends to retain the water in an even layer around the earth. It is asserted, however, as an explanation of the phenomenon which occurs, that the centripetal force acting at any point on the surface of the earth varies inversely as the square of the distance from that point to the moon, so that the centripetal force acting on the water at the side of the earth furthest removed from the moon is less effective than that on the side nearest to the moon, to the extent due to the length of the diameter of the earth. The result of this is that the centrifugal force overbalances the centripetal force, and the water tends to fly off, forming an anti-lunar wave crest at that point approximately equal, and opposite, to the wave crest at the point nearest to the moon. As the earth revolves, the crest of high water of the lunar tide remains opposite the centre of attraction of the sun and moon, so that a point on the surface will be carried from high water towards and past the trough of the wave, or low water, then past the crest of the anti-lunar tide, or high water again, and back to its original position under the moon. But while the earth is revolving the moon has traveled 13 degrees along the elliptical orbit in which she revolves around the earth, from west to east, once in 27 days 7 hr. 43 min, so that the earth has to make a fraction over a complete revolution before the same point is brought under the centre of attraction again This occupies on an average 52 min, so that, although we are taught that the tide regularly ebbs and flows twice in twenty-four hours, it will be seen that the tidal day averages 24 hr. 52 min, the high water of each tide in the Southern Ocean being at 12 hr. 26 min intervals. As a matter of fact, the tidal day varies from 24 hr. 35 min at new and full moon to 25 hr. 25 min at the quarters. Although the moon revolves around the earth in approximately 27-1/3 days, the earth has moved 27 degrees on its elliptical orbit around the sun, which it completes once in 365+ days, so that the period which elapses before the moon again occupies the same relative position to the sun is 29 days 12 hr. 43 min, which is the time occupied by the moon in completing her phases, and is known as a lunar month or a lunation.