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| WIND AND WAVES AND FUN Gallery 10 |
PICTURE AT THE TOP OF THE PAGE: Mostly, it was a pretty calm trip but punctuated by just a few
episodes with enough wind and wave action to make it fun. This (in South America in a fjord in Chile) is the
wind blowing the tops off of waves, something that probably inhibits the formation of waves. It doesn't stop
it, though.
episodes with enough wind and wave action to make it fun. This (in South America in a fjord in Chile) is the
wind blowing the tops off of waves, something that probably inhibits the formation of waves. It doesn't stop
it, though.
HERE IS a description of Katabatic Wind at a BBC site.
THIS IS a link to a short description with animation at polarfoundation.org. It emphasizes
such winds on the main Antarctic continent, where blowing downhill generally means blowing
from the interior toward the sea. We discovered that they can also be pretty strong on at
least one island off the coast.
THIS IS a link to a short description with animation at polarfoundation.org. It emphasizes
such winds on the main Antarctic continent, where blowing downhill generally means blowing
from the interior toward the sea. We discovered that they can also be pretty strong on at
least one island off the coast.
Gallery 1 -- Geography
Gallery 2 -- Snow and Ice Piles
Gallery 3 -- Glacier Fronts
Gallery 4 -- Glacier Retreat
Gallery 5 -- Beagle Channel
Gallery 6 -- Strange Icebergs
Gallery 7 -- (Big) Tabular Bergs
Gallery 8 -- Stranger Icebergs
Gallery 9 -- Penguins
Gallery 10 -- Wind and Waves
Gallery 11 -- Leaving a Wake
Gallery 12 -- The Southern Moon
Gallery 2 -- Snow and Ice Piles
Gallery 3 -- Glacier Fronts
Gallery 4 -- Glacier Retreat
Gallery 5 -- Beagle Channel
Gallery 6 -- Strange Icebergs
Gallery 7 -- (Big) Tabular Bergs
Gallery 8 -- Stranger Icebergs
Gallery 9 -- Penguins
Gallery 10 -- Wind and Waves
Gallery 11 -- Leaving a Wake
Gallery 12 -- The Southern Moon
Here is another picture just about like the one
at the top of the page in just about the same
location.
at the top of the page in just about the same
location.
When the wind kicks up the waves, the ship's
swimming pools will respond.
swimming pools will respond.
Katabatic Wind Number 1
Katabatic Wind Number 2
| We encountered something called a "Katabatic Wind", which can happen many places in the world but is common in Antarctica. However, it was a surprise to encounter it in the place where we did. Such a wind happens when air, cooled on top of a slope, comes tumbling down like a bunch of bowling balls (illustration to the left). We encountered two of them in the Antarctic Sound area, as pictured in the rough sketch of the area to the right, Don't take the boundaries of the various land masses too literally in that map. Wind Number 2, coming from Dundee Island, which we encountered while rounding Paulet Island, was the strongest. |
| The wind is whipping up spray from the ocean, cutting off the tops of waves, and causing those streamers (center picture). The rainbow is due to spray from the surface, not rain, which we did not have. |
| It didn't blow long enough to make big waves, but the ship leaned away from it (katabatic wind drawing above). The inset, from a calm, foggy day, shows the horizon as it should be. |
| Well, there were some waves. Here is the Corinthian II, a much smaller ship than ours, sailing past during the wind. Such ships are built to handle this, and there was no actual trouble. Below is the same ship, as we saw it the next (very calm) day near the Gerlache Strait. |
| The second, stronger, such wind found us as we rounded Paulet Island (the bare ground in the picture to the left). It is building in that left-hand picture and has become stronger in the picture to the right. |
| We first heard that it reached 85 knots, which would be 92 miles per hour, but later I heard 85 - 90 knots (98 - 103 miles per hour). A knot is a nautical mile per hour, and you can get ordinary miles by multiplying by 1.15. Well, ordinary for us landlubbers. Anyway it was a lot of wind. Several sites on the subject have told me that they can range from very calm to 200 miles per hour. So we had enough to make it exciting, but not enough to hurt. Also, it was pretty brief. Apparently the path the moving air takes down the mountain is fairly narrow, and we could sail out of it fairly quickly. |