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Dec 19, 2023

Anello Answers It: Sea Breezes Explained

Meteorologist It's that time of the year, where many of us are traveling to the Coast to head to the beach. Everyone always gets that wind blown hair look and it's always so relaxing feeling that

Meteorologist

It's that time of the year, where many of us are traveling to the Coast to head to the beach. Everyone always gets that wind blown hair look and it's always so relaxing feeling that breeze in the air. But where is that breeze from and why is it always so strong at the beach?

It's called a sea breeze and at its foundational level it has to do with the differences in the specific heat of water and land. That sounds very high-level-sciency but it's really a very simple concept. Land heats up very quickly while the ocean can absorb the same amount of the sun's rays but it will its temperature will not rise as much.

Now that we have established that the area over land will have higher temperature, we know that the air in that area will rise, because warm air rises. All of this air leaving the area will create a surface low pressure system.

All that air piles up, higher in the sky and creates a high pressure system aloft. Air pressure systems are sort of like the water cycle, meaning that this high pressure pushes air to what will be an upper level low pressure system. Air high in the sky is always colder because it is farther from the heat source, the surface.

If warm air rises, that means cold air has to sink and that is exactly what happens in this case. Again, as air piles up over the ocean, a second high pressure system is formed, but this one is at the surface. Here's a hard-and-fast weather rule for you...winds always blow from high to low. With a high pressure surface just above the ocean and a low pressure system sitting over the land, a gusty breeze stays present blowing from the ocean, to the shore. And there you have it...your sea breezes explained.

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Meteorologist