How does the gravitational pull of the moon create waves?

Question

My scientific knowledge is limited - Laymans terms please if its complex but.. Surely if the garvitational pulls of the Moon and Earth effect our seawater, how does the moons gravity field become more powerful attracting water towards it?

Surely it is like a tug of war and the Earth has the stronger pull?

Answer 1

Im not a professor, but the earth does have a stronger pull. Thats why the tides rise a matter of feet and not miles. There are 2 high tides, 1 from the moon one on the opposite side of earth from centrifigul force and lack of moon gravity.

Answer 2

That's right, the Earth does have a stronger pull, since it's bigger, and since the water is on the Earth, it feels an even stronger pull, since the strength of a gravitation field is inversely proportional to the square of the distance.

You can see that the water feels a stronger pull form the Earth because the water stays on the Earth and doesn't fly off into space.

The thing is that the moon pulls the water on the closest side of the Earth towards it, just a bit, and therefore it forms a bulge. Then there is also a bulge at the far side of the Earth also, because the moon isn't pulling the water there as much, and so it is deeper.

Hence there are two tides per day, one for each bulge.

Answer 3

Because the Earth and moon are constantly in motion, the pull of the moon's gravity is not consistent upon one place on the Earth. In a straight tug-of-war between the Earth and moon, Earth would obviously win every time. But the moon's influence 'pushes' the water, much like a hand stirring water in the bathtub. This causes a slight 'bow wave' that rotates around the planet, guided by the moon. This bow wave is the tide.

Answer 4

Lunar Tides

The gravitational pull of the moon and the sun on the Earth’s oceans is the major force involved in the creation of tides. Because the moon is much closer to the Earth than the sun, it has more gravitational attraction. When the moon is directly over a given point on the Earth’s surface, it exerts a powerful pull on the water there, which consequently rises above its normal level.

At the same time, the water covering the part of the Earth that is most distant from the moon bulges outwards as a result of the centrifugal force of the revolving Earth-moon system. This is the same force that pulls a child away from the centre of a revolving merry-go-round. The Earth-moon system revolves around a common centre, which is similar to the centre of a merry-go-round. A child close to the outer edge of a merry-go-round is pulled outwards more than one near the centre. Likewise, as the Earth revolves around the common centre of the Earth-moon system, the area furthest from the moon is subject to the greatest centrifugal force. As a result, the waters on that side swell outwards.

This means there are always two high-water areas on the Earth at any given time: the area under the moon and the area opposite the moon. Low tides exist in the areas between these high-tide bulges.

Answer 5

On a new moon and full moon you will get a lower tide than the rest of the moon phases. Due to gravitational pull. But it dose not create waves in the sea.

Answer 6

It doesn't have anything to do with magnetism or protons and neutrons.

First, the ocean waves are created mostly by wind, not by the Moon's gravity.  The Moon is responsible for tides.

The Moon's gravity isn't more powerful than Earth's at high tide.  That's why the water doesn't leave our planet altogether and go to the Moon.  But it does have an influence we can measure.  It's very tiny in the grand scheme of things, but a tiny influence on oceans that are thousands of miles across and many thousands of feet deep makes a "tiny" change in ocean levels that nevertheless amounts to several feet in our perspective.

Answer 7

Because that how graity is created. It's the pull of magnetic flux on the protons or neutrons on the earth, maybe even photons.