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A subharmonic lunar tide in the seas off Western Europe

Abstract

A small and often neglected tidal component, which is an exact subharmonic of the M2 tide, is shown to have unusually large amplitudes over a sea area stretching from Shetland to the Azores, including the North Sea. An explanation is offered in terms of normal oceanic modes recently computed by Platzman, and implications for tidal prediction procedures are discussed.

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Cartwright, D. A subharmonic lunar tide in the seas off Western Europe. Nature 257, 277–280 (1975). https://doi.org/10.1038/257277a0

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