Bad Geogerfy at the Olympics

[Superluminal]

While watching the USA play Russia in waterpolo today, the announcer made the comment that Russia had played on every continent except the Arctic and Antarctica.

Hmm, the Arctic continent. Maybe that is where Atlantis is.

[toolazytotypemyname]

i think it's even worse than that.

They've only been called Russia for the last 2 Olympics or so. Before that they were called the Commonwealth of Independent States, and prior to that who can forget the USSR?

[AGN Fuel]

While watching the USA play Russia in waterpolo today, the announcer made the comment that Russia had played on every continent except the Arctic and Antarctica.

Hmm, the Arctic continent. Maybe that is where Atlantis is.

We had one of the radio commentators a couple of days ago, who apologized for the fact that there was a delay in the start of a race, because "the P.A. has to announce the runners in three languages - French, Greek and Australian"! :lol:

[Superluminal]

I thought Austrailian was a language! Or at least that's what I learned watching those Fosters commercials :lol: .

[Meteora]

I once sat next to a guy from Australia on a flight from San Francisco to Denver. He told me that on a previous trip to the USA, he'd chatted with a girl who asked him....

"Where did you lean to speak English?"

:o #-o

[Wally]

speaking of Australia and Foster's Beer, they have a newer commercial where they ask how you can tell if a beer's from Australia. They conclude by saying the "bubbles circle counter-clockwise" (para-phrased).

Now, if they were eluding to the coriolis (sp) effect, which is the only thing I can assume, then shouldn't the joke have been that the bubbles circle clockwise???

Guess they had a 50/50 shot. Too bad they missed! #-o

[milli360]

It gets complicated. When air is rushing into a center, the particles (in the southern hemisphere) are deflected to the left, which is a counter-clockwise-type curved motion. However, in relation to the center, the particles are then going about it in a clockwise motion--so hurricanes rotate clockwise. I think the BA goes on about this somewhere, on the internet I think...

If particles are going out from a center, then they'll still turn to the left, and the motion will be counter-clockwise.

Or, it could just be that the beer-drinkers are looking at the glass upside-down. :)

[Meteora]

The Coriolis effect/force causes horizontal trajectories to bend right in the northern hemisphere and left in the southern hemisphere, as milli360 said. In a closed container with no existing circulation, there will be no effect from Coriolis. In closed container with existing circulation, in either direction, there will be no effect on the motion relative to the container, and in a small container, obviously the effect would not be noticeable at all. So it's all irrelevant to beer. :D

In the case of a large storm, the pressure gradient force (in the case of a cyclone that is not increasing or decreasing rapidly in strength) forces air into a trajectory aimed directly at the center of the circulation. The Coriolis effect/force turns the air (relative to the ground) to the left (in Australia). Soon, the PGF and CF balance each other and the air flows in a clockwise direction around the cyclone's center. Near the ground, friction adds one more vector to the mix, causing the air to flow inward toward the center. Of course, a real cyclone is much more complicated than that, and has motion in three dimensions, but that's the basic plan.