SCIENCE!

[ER]

Love it or hate it science encompasses everything that is, was, or will be, and in a surprise twist, all is one and now is forever!

Check out this video from right on the equator in Ecuador.

To break down this demonstration of the Coriolis effect in action, when the presenter drops leaves into the tub directly on Earth's equator, there is an absence of the spin seen everywhere on the planet, the leaves simply descend straight down the drain.

When she moves north or south of the equator even a very short distance, a clockwise or counterclockwise spin is evident. I know (or hope) we all know this, but seeing it in action still makes me smile, and I think this is cool.

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[indianasmith]

I have always wondered about that!

[WingedSerpent]

I find the biological sciences much more interesting then the physical ones. 

Here, learn about a type of shark that lives for over 500 years.

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[frank]

Sorry to say, but the Coriolis effect does not work on small bodies such as water in a basin. As you can see in the video, she pours in the water from different corners when she moves away from the equator (the second time you can even see the leaf spin in the "correct" direction beforehand). When she drains the basin on the equator the water had time to settle before.
You can find more elaborate explanatons why it's a myth on the internet.

[ER]

Sorry to say, but the Coriolis effect does not work on small bodies such as water in a basin. As you can see in the video, she pours in the water from different corners when she moves away from the equator (the second time you can even see the leaf spin in the "correct" direction beforehand). When she drains the basin on the equator the water had time to settle before.
You can find more elaborate explanatons why it's a myth on the internet.

Then why does the water spin in flushed toilet bowls and in sinks when the plug is pulled? Those are tiny collections of water. In Kenya the effect was replicated in an even smaller bucket. At my home there is counterclockwise drainage but I recall in New Zealand and Brazil we watched fascinated by the clockwise spin.

[frank]

In short, the Coriolis effect does affect small bodies, but you need extremely careful and elaborate settings to detect that. Note that the spinning itself is not the effect, but the prediction of the direction. In everyday life, the spinning direction is much more affected by such things like the shape of the sink, the position of the faucet relative to the sink, the position of the outlet relative to the sink, etc. Thus, it is not suprising to see different (constant) directions in the spinning in different households, it just has rarely anything to do with the hemisphere. We checked that back in our highschool and had different directions within the same building.

Here are two links on the general validity of the statement but also the drawback of showing it with something like a sink.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-somebody-finally-sett/

https://www.ems.psu.edu/~fraser/Bad/BadCoriolis.html

[ER]

Interesting articles! I wish I knew more about physics and astronomy but they weren't my areas.