By Dan Drollette. Dan Drollette is a freelance writer. Physicist Stuart Kohlhaggen, director of Questacon, Australia's national science museum, says the how and why of the Coriolis is one of the most-asked questions. Colorful as such stories may be, the impact of the Coriolis is exaggerated, says Kohlhaggen.
People continue to believe in it, despite all evidence to the contrary.
It's almost as if they think there's a Coriolis fairy. Technically speaking, the Coriolis is not even a real force, but a fictitious one resulting from a rotating frame of reference. To understand why it works, imagine that you are looking down at the globe from above. The Earth would look like an old-fashioned vinyl record player, with the North Pole for the axis. At the center, the record moves so slowly that it appears to stand still, while at the far edge the record is traveling quickly, where it has more distance to cover in each revolution.