Sport Pilot Talk

Watching their report on the tsunami in Indonesia this morning. They were listing the things that made this one worse than others and one was...

FULL MOON!

I guess the gravity of the moon is greater when it is in sunlight? Does that mean our airplanes are a little lighter during a full moon?

The CNN report is correct; it's the combined inline gravitational pull of the moon and the sun around the time of full moons and new moons that cause "spring" tides. Nothing bogus about it.



https://earthsky.org/earth/tides-and-th ... on-and-sun

Actually, Jim, tidal forces are indeed higher during a full moon. That's not because of the moonlight, but rather because of additive gravitational effects caused by the near-linear alignment of the moon-earth-sun system. Sailors and fishermen have observed this since pre-history. (As a side note, numerical solution of the astronomical three-body problem eluded mathematicians for centuries. It was only the advent of the computer that made the computation feasible. )

Besides, the Earth was flat back then - or so they thought!

I rushed my posting as I was called to the breakfast table

Yes I do know the effects of New Moon Full Moon on tides. Depending on local bottom geography, the differences may be minor or pretty large.

Unfortunately in the Sunda Straits, the bottom is shallow which does increase tidal changes between moon orbits. But the underseas landslide would have just as devastating during low tide due to the bottom.

I was just amused at the way they reported it. Breathlessly with a full screen shot of a full moon. It left the impression of full moon = disaster. And I should point out that CNN was not alone in reporting in this manner.