What Makes a Wave？)

Hi, I am Jared. Welcome to Fun Science Demos. Take a look at that wave. It is moving, but what makes it move? We have slowed it down so you can see the energy as it crashes on the beach, but where does that energy come from? What makes waves? Believe it or not, wind makes waves. When wind blows over the surface of the ocean for a long distance and a long time, that wind makes waves. That means the energy from the wind moves the water. So I am going to try and make some waves with the energy from my wind. Let us see if we can do it. You see the waves coming down? The energy from my wind is moving the water. Now there wasn't much energy in my wind, and I didn't blow for very long, so the waves were small. Well, what happens if we have stronger wind with more energy for a longer time? Check this out. This allows my wind to have more energy for a longer time. This shoots out more air with more energy. Let us see what kind of waves we can make with this. I am going to shoot air over the top of our ocean and see what kind of waves it makes. Here we go. Now I am going to keep the air coming, and you can see the waves as they make their way down the ocean, down our water. A nice, steady wave motion. The energy from this wind is pushing on the water, and that is where the waves are coming from. Nice, steady waves. And if I get wind with more energy, what happens with my waves? They get bigger. If I have less energy for my wind, the waves get smaller. So we just saw wind moving water to make waves, but wind can move other things, too. Things like sailboats and surfers. Let us take a look. Sail on. Science is so cool. If you want to learn more about wind and waves, check out our videos and links in the video description. Sail on. Thanks for watching. NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology