Suzanne Jacobs, age 8. of St. Catharines, Ont., for her question:

What exactly are ocean currents?

The restless ocean is never still. Big waves and little waves toss up and down upon the surface and twice each day the tides wash up and down upon the beaches. Deep, deep down in the ocean the water moves to and fro in strange patterns that we do not yet understand. None of these things are what we call ocean currents.

One ocean current is the Gulf Stream, which swirls around the North Atlantic Ocean. Another is the Japan Current which swirls around the North Pacific Ocean. There are other big ocean currents in the South Atlantic, the South Pacific and in the Indian Ocean. Each of these currents is like a river in the ocean. It is like a wide stream of salty water flowing in its own direction through the salty sea. Sometimes it is wgrmer than the ocean around it and sometimes it is cooler.

At the eastern side of Canada is Newfoundland, whose rocky shores are washed by the bleak North Atlantic. Here in these waters, two great ocean currents meet and clash. Ono is the warm and gentle Gulf Stream coming up from the tropical waters of the south. The other is the cold and icy Labrador current coming down from polar seas of the north. The two great rivers meet in the ocean off the shores of Newfoundland. The cold water from the north chills the Gulf Stream and the air above it. This warm air then turns    some of its vapor into foggy mist. The dense fogs that form over these waters are caused by the meeting of the two great ocean currents, one    warm, the other cold. The Labrador current is a river of Arctic water streaming southward. The Gulf Stream comes up from as far south as the equator. Just north of the equator, thore is a belt of winds which blows always eastward. They are strong, steady winds and they blow the ocean waves before them, always towards the east. These running waves form the wide ocean river which is the Gulf Stream.

The great current sweeps across the Atlantic until it nears the shores of the Americas. Off Florida, it is bent northward by the shape of the land. It flows northward until it crashes into the Labrador current. Then it turns westward back across the Atlantis to Europe. Though the shape of the land forces it to turn again, this time southward. Down it flows along the coast of Africa until it gets almost to the equator again.

Here the groat river of water moots itself. The easterly winds are still blowing and they take it on still another circle around the North Atlantic Ocean. Each of the great ocean currents swings around in a huge eddy which has no end and no beginning.