Upwelling is Counterintuitive

I believe that this can also happen from sustained offshores. I was in Guanacaste in the spring and it had been blowing hard offshore for days, leading to a rough upwelling. Fortunately had some warning and brought a spring suit but the locals were miserable. winds shifted more onshore and it warmed back up.

 

I'm pretty sure near the equator the Coriolis force is a lot less of a factor, maybe none at all. So in CR straight offshores are most conducive to upwelling, unlike the mid latitudes where a more side shore flow is most effective in pushing water offshore and bringing up the deeper layer.

I was thinking all spring that as cold as the water was here in March - April, its just a matter of time before we get a NASTY upwelling event on the Delmarva.

 

Translation... Currents, in both the atmosphere and in the ocean, are named by where they come from, not where they're going. The Gulf Stream comes from the Gulf. A south wind comes from the south.

 

Uh.. No.

I hope that you're kidding, Cep.

North wind = blows from the N towards the S
South wind = blows from the S towards the N

 

Exactly bro. I'm pretty sure cep was being facetious so I was really laughing as this isn't his first good one-liner on SI.

 

We see upwelling here on the banx all friggin summer! Offshore SW winds kill us. I left town yesterday.(Nags head) knee high and 60 degrees drove to Hatteras waist to chest high balmy 82 degree water and no one out. Just crazy water temp difference but we live it all summer. Oh and Rodanthe Salvo and Hatteras got horribly flooded by (Hurricane Arthur) Soundside surge once again...mattresses, furniture, couches and crazy debris all over the roads. New inlet bridge was damaged and now is an inlet flowing fairly deep at high tide. I feel for da boys down south as they pay heavy dues.

 

The "Japanese Current" creates upwelling in Baja Norte all year long. As you surf from Southern CA down into North to central baja, the water gets colder, and colder. Last time I went deep was in July I think and I ended up rocking a 4 mil, when it was trunkable up north. Made no sense. The San Diego locals explained to me that it is a constant upwelling down there and once you clear central baja it starts warming back up. Makes no sense.

 

Just when you thought it was safe to break out the boardies.

 

Corilios effect and something called the Ekman effect.
Basically if you are in the northern hemisphere, and put you hand out into the wind, your thumb will point in the direction that the surface water is moving...90 degrees against the wind.
On the east coast, as that surface water is blown out to sea, it is replaced with cold water from the deep.
It can also happen though on a hard west wind, but it seems more common on a hard south.

 

It's science. Surface water is pushed at a 90 degree right angle to the wind. So a south wind in NJ will push the surface water east thus the pushed out water replaced by bottom upwelling. Conversely a north wind warms the water as the warmer surface water is pushed west onto the beach pushing out colder bottom water.

I saw this in OBX a few years ago in July. A SW wind for 3 days led to 58 degree water.