When the equator is crossed and the toilet is flushed the water spins counterclockwise?

Question

rather than clockwise. Why does crossing the equator change the direction in which toilet water spins?

Answer 1

the coriolis effect derives from the earth's rotation. the closer to the equator something is, the faster it must travel in order to achieve that once-per-day rotation. conversely, when parallel currents move at the same speed, the one at higher latitude will pull ahead of the one at lower latitude, because it's travelling along a smaller circumference

when there's a low barometric pressure center present, the higher pressures on the outside of the system will push the faster, high latitude current towards the equator, and the other current upwards to the poles, in an attempt to achieve an equilibrium. this is how cyclonic storms develop their spin

the environment of your toilet bowl, however, lacks any significant differences in either latitude or air pressure, so it all comes down to how the water pipes into the bowl. it wouldn't surprise me if some manufacturers designed their fixtures with this in mind - american and australian model commodes

(this makes me wonder, however, if you can control the spin by peeing on the left or right side of the drain. excuse me a minute . . . ;D )

Answer 2

The erroneous bit of folk wisdom you refer to says that water always drains in a clockwise direction in the Southern Hemisphere, and in a counterclockwise direction in the Northern Hemisphere. The supposed reason for this "fact" is the Coriolis effect, which has to do with the effect of the earth's rotation on moving objects.

Well, there is such a thing as the Coriolis effect. It explains why macroevents such as hurricanes rotate in a clockwise direction in the Southern Hemisphere and counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere. However, when you get down to itty-bitty phenomena such as the water draining out of your bathtub, the Coriolis effect is insignificant, amounting to roughly three ten-millionths of the force of gravity (in Boston, at least, which is where they happened to do the measuring).

The boring truth is that water drains every which way no matter what hemisphere you're in, for reasons which have to do mostly with the shape of the drain, the way you poured in the water in the first place, and so on.

Answer 3

It doesn't. The Coriolis Effect is too weak to have any visible affect on the water before it's all gone down the drain. Your toilet water is going to move in the direction specified by the shape of the bowl and the jets, and that's not going to change whether you're in North America or Australia.

For more info, you'll want to look on wikipedia for Coriolis.

Answer 4

the angular velocity of the earth is 15 degrees per hour.... in order for this to happen the equater has a higher liner velocity than 60 degrees south... say 2000 and 500 repetivly....ok so heres a thing i leared in earth science.. lets say that bolivia wanted to fire a missle at argentina without gps or anything special.... the difference in speed would cause the missle to deflect to the left because where it was launged the linear velocity was say 1000km/h and its target was moving at 950 km/h the missle would still move at 1000km/h carring it to the left so it hits Uruguay.... in the norther hemisphere the deflecton is to the right in the sout it is to the left nommater what...now a tolet is filled with water on its way down on its slant it changes lattitude slightly causeing a clockwise rotation in the north and a counterclockwise in the south...
hope this helps

Answer 5

In a perfect, impossible to achieve world, this would be true due to the Coriolis effect (the impact of the rotating earth acting on the atmosphere, but in reality, a toilet is much to small and chaotic a system for this to be true, despite urban legend.

Anything less than a hurricane and its basically up to design and pure chance.

Answer 6

Yes In southern hemisphere water spins in opposite direction

Answer 7

This is known as the "Coriolis Effect" and it is very weak when applied to toilet bowls and such, but it is also the reason why hurricanes in the northern hemisphere rotate counter clockwise and why typhoons in the southern hemisphere rotate clockwise. It is due to the earth's rotation.

http://ww2010.atmos.uiuc.edu/(Gh)/guides/mtr/fw/crls.rxml

Answer 8

The water spins counter clockwise. Other tidbits are the man in the moon is upside down and soon it will be spring

Answer 9

GO HERE TO LEARN ALL THE TRUTH ABOUT THIS MISCONCEPTION:
http://www.ems.psu.edu/~fraser/Bad/BadCoriolis.html


HUGE STORM SYSTEMS ARE EFFECTED ARE EFFECTED BY THIS FORCE THAT ARE HUNDRED OF MILES WIDE BUT NOT TINY THINGS LIKE TOLIETS I REPEAT NOT TINY THINGS LIKE TOLIETS . Toilets can spin in any direction because the force on small things like tolits are so microscopic the force has has about 99.999% NO affect on the way it spins. The spin in the toilet is made by how the toilet was designed to spin. see below:


GO HERE TO LEARN ALL THE TRUTH ABOUT THIS MISCONCEPTION:
http://www.ems.psu.edu/~fraser/Bad/BadCoriolis.html

Answer 10

It makes no difference which side of the equator you're on...the direction of draining water is unaffected. See this website for a complete discussion about this myth ==>http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/coriolis.html