How Does the Moon Affect Earth’s Tides?

The moon pulls on Earth, and that makes the water move. Imagine you're holding a bucket of water, if you swing it around, the water sloshes from side to side. The moon is like your arm swinging around Earth, and it moves the oceans in a similar way. When the moon is near, it pulls the water up on one side of Earth, making high tide, and leaves low tide on the opposite side. This happens twice every day, that’s why we have two high tides and two low tides each day.

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Examples

A bucket of water sloshes when you swing it around, like how the moon pulls on Earth's oceans.
The ocean gets higher near the moon, that’s high tide. It gets lower away from the moon, that’s low tide.
When the sun and moon are both pulling in the same direction, tides get really big, that’s a spring tide.

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Categories: Science · tides· moon· gravity· oceanography