<p>This is a sea/ocean wave image which can be found in several places on the internet. I cannot find its origin and any image search did not yield conclusive results. It may even be a render.</p>
<p>Question: is there any natural phenomenon which can produce such a wave? A seabed discontinuity? Two water masses of different temperature/salination? Would it produce the foam? Why does the left part seem to flow over the right part at places?</p>
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/AcDOU.jpg" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/AcDOU.jpg" alt="enter image description here" /></a></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-27T16:23:54.830Z
It looks like the wake of a boat. The image-finding service Tineye finds this first appearing on a Russian photo-sharing form in 2016, and repeatedly used as a background image on websites since.
jeffronicus
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-27T20:03:34.307Z
These are just the bow waves you can observe by looking over the side of a ship. They are produced by the difference between the group and the phase speed of water surface waves.
Wolfgang Bangerth
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-28T00:34:48.360Z
@WolfgangBangerth sounds like a great answer if you can add just a little, like a reference/equation/etc
JeopardyTempest
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-03-31T17:00:43.670Z
@JeopardyTempest This is about the extent to which I can explain it. It's clearly the wake of a boat, with the small waves traveling forward with the boat (carrying in the imparted momentum) but because of the difference between group and phase speed for water waves, the direction of the small waves is not aligned with the direction of the outward propagating "Mach cone".
Wolfgang Bangerth
<oceanography><waves><sea-floor>
Sea waves with perpendicular discontinuity
scriptfoo
# Sea waves with perpendicular discontinuity

(Asked by: username_0 on 2023-03-27)

This is a sea/ocean wave image which can be found in several places on the internet. I cannot find its origin and any image search did not yield conclusive results. It may even be a render.

Question: is there any natural phenomenon which can produce such a wave? A seabed discontinuity? Two water masses of different temperature/salination? Would it produce the foam? Why does the left part seem to flow over the right part at places?

[![enter image description here](https://i.sstatic.net/AcDOU.jpg)](https://i.sstatic.net/AcDOU.jpg)

**Tags:** oceanography, waves, sea-floor

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: It looks like the wake of a boat. The image-finding service Tineye finds this first appearing on a Russian photo-sharing form in 2016, and repeatedly used as a background image on websites since.  
> **username_2**: These are just the bow waves you can observe by looking over the side of a ship. They are produced by the difference between the group and the phase speed of water surface waves.  
> **username_3**: @username_2 sounds like a great answer if you can add just a little, like a reference/equation/etc  
> **username_2**: @username_3 This is about the extent to which I can explain it. It's clearly the wake of a boat, with the small waves traveling forward with the boat (carrying in the imparted momentum) but because of the difference between group and phase speed for water waves, the direction of the small waves is not aligned with the direction of the outward propagating "Mach cone".  

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## 0 answers

