What is the Contrast between a spring tides and neap tides?

Answer 1

Perigee tides involve the Moon's orbit around the Earth. It does not go in a perfect circle but rather in an ellipse/oval shaped revolution. Because of that there are some points in the Moon's orbit at which the Moon is closer to the Earth. "Perigee" is the point of closest approach. With that closeness it causes a greater gravitational attraction between Earth and the Moon, pulling more water towards the Moon, causing what we know as high and low tides.

"Spring tides" can occur during a perigee tide but not necessarily. A spring tide is a tide that occurs when the Sun, Earth and the Moon are nearly in a straight line, at a NEW MOON, or at a Full Moon.

The highest tides happen then.

Answer 2

High and low tides are caused by the positions of the Sun and Moon relative to your position on the Earth's surface. The masses of the Sun and Moon gravitationally attract the water on the Earth's surface and cause the water to "bulge" away from the center of the Earth. Although the Moon is much smaller than the Sun, it has a greater pull on the water because it is so much closer to the Earth. Since both the Moon and Sun are pulling on the Earth's water, highest tides (Spring Tides) occur when the Sun and Moon are both directly overhead (noonish) so they are pulling together on the water in your area. Lowest tides (Neap Tides) occur around 6 hours earlier/later when the Moon and Sun are on the horizon and are both pulling the water sideways away from you. Confusingly, a very high tide will also occur around midnight when the Sun and Moon are aligned, but on the opposite side of the Earth from you (New Moon phase). This is caused by the combination of two effects: 1) the Sun/Moon combo is pulling the water surface into an elliptical shape, and 2) the Sun/Moon combo are also pulling on the Earth, pulling it away from the surface of the water on the far side of the Earth (the Earth and Moon are actually rotating around a common point which is not at the center of the Earth). Well What_is_the_difference_between_high_tide_and_low_tidehigh and low tides also occur when the Sun and Moon are on directly opposite sides of the Earth (Full Moon phase), as their gravitation pulls still accentuate each other. When the Earth, Sun, and Moon are not lined up, there will be less dramatic differences between high and low tides. The Moon pulls the water one way and the Sun pulls another. The total height of the water surface is the result of a combination of these pulls, and is usually highest beneath the Moon.

Answer 3

high tides are high water level they are called spring tides and low tides are low water level they are called neap tides. high tides and low tides occur when the sun, earth and the moon are inline. during new moon there are high tides at west and east and low tides at north and west, because the direction which the moon is facing that direction will have a high tide.

Read more: What_is_a_high_tide_and_low_tide

Answer 4

To know the difference you first must know what they are.

Spring tides are the highest of high tides and lowest of low tides, when the moon, Earth, and Sun are aligned as following from the geographic North Pole:

m---E---S

That way, the Sun helps the moon pull on the Earth's water, moving much of it to the direct and opposite points of tide on Earth and leaving little of it in other places.

............lowest

m highest E highest S

............lowest

Neap tides are the lowest of high tides and highest of low tides, because the gravity of the moon and Sun are working against each other:

m

|

E---S

More water is pulled towards the moon, but the gravity is weak, so there is more water left elsewhere than there is during a Spring tide.

...................m

..........."low" h tide

"high" l tide E "high" l tide S

..........."low" h tide

May be tricky to understand.

A high tide is just a time where an area has slightly higher sea level and a low tide is when an are has lower sea level.

A spring tide is the most exaggerated and a neap tide is the least.

Answer 5

Spring tides are the greatest difference between high and low tides. A high tide is when the water reaches its highest level.

Answer 6

Spring tides are higher than other tides because of the constructive interference of Sun and Moon bulges that occurs when the Sun, Moon, and Earth are aligned.

Answer 7

Neap tides are average tides. Spring tides are tides that are unusually high or low