Could someone explain what Coriolis force is in plain language? Thanks so much!

Question

I did horribly on my AP physics test btw lol

(also got a headache trying to read the wikipedia entry haha)

In: Earth Science

Answer 1

Imagine a rotating disk, like a vinyl record. An object that is sitting on the disk near the centre is only moving “sideways” quite slowly (as in moving sideways as it passes the 12 o’clock position). An object sitting near the edge is moving “sideways” much faster.

So an object that is travelling outwards starts off moving “sideways” quite slowly, but as it nears the edge it must move “sideways” quite fast. So it must have accelerated sideways. We know that force equals mass multiplied by acceleration, so if the object has non-zero mass and non-zero “sideways” acceleration then it must have non-zero “sideways” force.

This “sideways” force is the coriolis force.