tidal force

noun

the gravitational pull exerted by a celestial body that raises the tides on another body within the gravitational field, dependent on the varying distance between the bodies.

tidal force

A secondary effect of the gravitational forces between two objects orbiting each other, such as the Earth and the Moon, that tends to elongate each body along the axis of a line connecting their centers. Tidal forces are responsible for the fluctuation of the tides as well as for the synchronous rotation of certain moons as they orbit their planets.

A ship is wind-rode when the wind overcomes an opposite tidal force, and she rides head to wind.

They judge that the tidal force is ample to scour away clean all the sand deposited both in and outside the reef.

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