Topic summary
Oceanic current
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Ocean current.
Wind-driven circulation
Surface oceanic currents are driven by wind currents, the large scale prevailing winds drive major persistent ocean currents, and seasonal or occasional winds drive currents of similar persistence to the winds that drive them, and the Coriolis effect plays a major role in their development. The Ekman spiral velocity distribution results in the currents flowing at an angle to the driving winds, and they develop typical clockwise spirals in the Northern Hemisphere and counter-clockwise rotation in the Southern Hemisphere. In addition, the areas of surface ocean currents move somewhat with the seasons; this is most notable in equatorial currents.