c.o.o.l. fact #2
Tsunamis are the most dramatic and destructive of waves. Underwater disturbances, such as volcanoes, earthquakes and landslides, are the cause of these monster waves. The largest tsunami recorded measured 210 feet above sea level when it reached Siberia's Kamchatka Peninsula in 1737.

c.o.o.l. fact #1
It all started with the mail. Benjamin Franklin, a great scientist, inventor and founding father of the USA, was appointed joint Postmaster General by the English King for the North American colonies on August 10, 1753. He noticed that ships traveling from England to the colonies would take a week longer than those traveling the opposite course. He asked whalers about their experience and, in this way, learned there was a river in the sea, called the Gulf Stream, that flowed up the east coast of America and then east to England, helping those ships traveling to England, and slowing down those traveling to the colonies.

c.o.o.l. fact #3
The biggest tides we know of occur in the Bay of Fundy, in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. The level of the ocean changes as much as 17 meters (57 feet) between low and high tide. That is as high as two houses!

c.o.o.l. fact #4
Waves are most often caused by winds. But what causes the wind? The sun. Where the sun beats down directly on the equatorial ocean, the ocean water and atmosphere is hotter than at higher latitudes (north and south). The resulting temperature imbalance creates a poleward flow of heat that is redistributed by atmospheric winds moving heat away from the equator.