If you look in your toilet bowl after it is flushed in the northern hemisphere.Then look in your loo after it is flushed in the Southern hemisphere. The water will be turning in opposite directions?
2006-10-04 08:40:22 · 12 answers · asked by dewhatulike 5 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Earth Sciences & Geology
No this is a myth that has become an urban legend. People keep telling it as if it were the truth because they don't know any better.
Here is what it says on livescience.com
Water drains backwards in the Southern Hemisphere due to the Earth's rotation?
Not only is the Earth's rotation too weak to affect the direction of water flowing in a drain, tests you can easily perform in a few washrooms will show that water whirlpools both ways depending on the sink's structure, not the hemisphere.
2006-10-04 08:49:32 · answer #1 · answered by dlobryan1 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
What you're referring to is known as the Coriolis Effect. It occurs with a sufficiently large body of water (it has to have mass). It is not necessarily the case with toilets, but that is because the water that comes into your toilet comes in at an angle, which has a greater effect on the direction of the spinning water than the Coriolis Effect.
The effect occurs when a body of water is drained, and the shape of whatever contains the water does not affect the direction of spin. In those cases, water in the Northern Hemisphere will always drain in the same direction (I can't remember which one.) The reason this happens is because of the rotation of the Earth.
2006-10-04 08:49:04 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
The direction that the water swirls in the toilet depends entirely on the toilet design. Water draining from the bathtub will go counter-clockwise North of the Equator and clockwise South of the Equator.
2006-10-04 08:49:48 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
no longer particular about nail biting, yet I did listen that there are extra germs on an place of work telephone than on a rest room, in reality becasue the lavatory is wiped clean usually and the phone receives over regarded!
2016-12-04 06:39:33 · answer #4 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No. The water will spin in whatever direction you start it of in. Earths rotation has nothing to do with it.
2006-10-04 10:37:28 · answer #5 · answered by Lab 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
IT's True ! It's also true that if you put a pack of wintergreen life savers in your mouth, turn out the light, stand in front of a mirror and chew them really fast with your mouth open, they will spark !
2006-10-04 08:51:13 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
Maybe yes, maybe no. The real question is; "why are you looking down toilet bowls?"
2006-10-04 11:31:41 · answer #7 · answered by Amphibolite 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
False. Stand up to your teachers and others if you hear this nonsense.
http://www.ems.psu.edu/~fraser/Bad/BadCoriolis.html
http://www.snopes.com/science/coriolis.htm
2006-10-04 09:54:17 · answer #8 · answered by tbom_01 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Yes it is true. Look at the drain in your bathtub. Same thing.
2006-10-04 08:48:59 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
good question.. i have heard that too and always wondered if it was true.. let me know when you find out.
2006-10-04 08:49:16 · answer #10 · answered by sea_sher 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋