History Main / MegaMaelstrom

* ''Anime/PokemonGenerations'': "[[Recap/PokemonGenerationsE8TheCavern The Cavern]]" has Kyogre creating these in addition to HostileWeather. The island that Mossdeep City is on gets surrounded by maelstroms the size of cities. Compared to the games, even the remakes, that mostly only imply that the catastrophe would be a Great Flood, this shows that the resulting storm is far more catastrophic than that, showing that even aquatic Pokemon would suffer from the apocalyptic underwater currents generated.

* In ''Anime/DragonBallZ'', one of these was made by the spirit bomb used to defeat Frieza. [[spoiler:Except Frieza wasn't actually dead]].

[[folder:Mythology]]

* ''TabletopGame/ArsMagica'' is set in a "[[MedievalEuropeanFantasy Mythic Europe]]" where AllMythsAreTrue, so giant whirlpools crop up from time to time. They're ''incredibly'' lucrative sources of certain types of {{Mana}}... all the more so, the closer a mage can get to their deadly core...

* As noted in the description, maelstroms appear all over the world, but often look rather formless as they are simply two currents crashing into each other in opposite directions. Whirlpools do exists as well, but they are not usually fast moving enough to be consider a maelstrom and are ''never'' as large as a Mega Maelstrom.

Occasionally, the Mega Maelstrom may not even be made of water but something [[BuffySpeak vortex-y]] that might suck in people or things around it. This version can overlap with GravitySucks.

* ''Tabletop/SalvageHiddenTreasures'' has the "Maelstrom" event, which allows the player to relocate any tile anywhere in the sea.

* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman1987'': During ComicBook/TheContest the final challenge is a race with a number of magical obstacles the contestants are not warned about. The first is a giant maelstrom that sucks in all the contestants but Venelia, who managed to finish the swimming portion before it really got going. ComicBook/{{Artemis}} gets her first on panel rescue pulling Mala from the treacherous waters.

* ''Anime/DragonBallZ'' made one of these when Frieza was [[spoiler:thought to be dead]].

-->-- [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=378428 Vortex Elemental]], ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering''

* ''{{Manga/Uzumaki}}'' features whirlpools from the beginning. They start out as small eddies in rivers, but by the end, they're large enough to swallow boats. [[spoiler:An unusually large example near the end pulls several full-sized ships to the bottom of the ocean when they're sent to rescue the people of Kurozu-cho]].
* The eighth episode of ''Anime/PokemonGenerations'' has Kyogre creating these in addition to HostileWeather. The island that Mossdeep City is on gets surrounded by maelstroms the size of cities. Compared to the games, even the remakes, that mostly only imply that the catastrophe would be a Great Flood, this shows that the resulting storm is far more catastrophic than that, showing that even aquatic Pokemon would suffer from the apocalyptic underwater currents generated.

[[folder:Film]]
* The closing bars of Darla Dimple's VillainSong in ''WesternAnimation/CatsDontDance'' show Danny and Sawyer circling each other while caught in a vortex, looking appropriately scared and doomed. Fortunately, this scene exists only in Darla's mind, but it illustrates just how craven and ruthless she is in order to maintain her ''prima donna'' status at Mammoth Studios.
* In ''Film/TheFinalCountdown'' there's a time vortex that is kind of a sideways maelstrom, that ''literally'' swallows the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz.
* In ''Disney/TheLittleMermaid'', the sea witch Ursula wrestles the crown and trident away from King Triton, stirs the sea until she has formed a huge vortex, and traps Ariel on dry sea bed at its bottom. Ursula then toys with poor Ariel, who has little room to dodge deadly bolts from the trident.
* In ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanAtWorldsEnd'', [[spoiler:Calypso]] creates a massive maelstrom that serves as the battleground for TheClimax.
* Zig Zagged in ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory3'': [[spoiler:Near the end, the toys get put inside a trash machine that has scraps flowing down in a vaguely funnel shape towards a melting point with no way to climb out. They were saved by a claw machine.]]

* TropeCodifier is ''A Descent Into the Maelstrom'' by Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. The narrator is awed by watching the "Moskoe-strom" [[note]]see "Moskstraumen" in RealLife section[[/note]], described as a gigantic whirlpool of "more than a mile in diameter", from a mountain top in the Lofoten islands. His guide, a local fisherman, then tells him a story of how he and his two brothers were sucked into the Moskoe-strom in the middle of a storm. While the fisherboat was spiralling at high speed around the edge of the funnel, the fisherman had time to observe that small, cylindrical objects were sucked slower into the funnel than other objects. By lashing himself to an empty barrel, the man managed to outlast the whirlpool and was saved, while his elder brother clung to the fishing boat and was sucked down.
* In the ''Literature/{{Dragonlance}}'' world of Krynn, at the center of the Blood Sea of Istar lies a giant vortex known as the Maelstrom. It was created when the Gods destroyed the city of Istar during the Cataclysm. The Maelstrom constantly stirs up the soil causing the water to look red which is how the sea got its name, though the legend on Krynn was that the color was really caused by the blood of all those who died in Istar.
* Paul the Deacon's ''History of the Lombards'' (c. 790 AD) discusses maelstroms in chapter 6. Paul believes maelstroms switch between sucking and emitting water twice a day, thus causing the tides. Especially there is huge maelstrom called "Navel of the Sea" in the North Sea and another one in the Channel near Alderney. One time, an entire fleet was sucked into this latter whirlpool, and only a single survivor managed to cling to a rock in the sea, from where he could see right down into the maelstrom. The man expected to die, when luckily the maelstrom switched from sucking to spitting and threw up the ships it had sucked in; the man managed to grab one of the ships and made it back to land.
* ''Literature/PercyJacksonAndTheOlympians''. The Sea of Monsters had Charybdis herself .[[note]]see Mythology section[[/note]]

* At the end of ''Literature/TwentyThousandLeaguesUnderTheSea'' by Creator/JulesVerne, Professor Aronnax and his friends are just trying to flee from the ''Nautilus'' in one of her skiffs, when they realize the submarine has been caught by the Lofoten maelstrom. They want to turn back, but the current rips the skiff away from the ''Nautilus''. Professor Arronax then loses consciousness by bumping his head; when he comes to he and his friends are in safety in a fisherman's hut in the Lofoten. He doesn't know how they escaped the maelstrom, or whether the ''Nautilus'' escaped.
* In ''Literature/{{Redwall}} The Bellmaker'', Joseph and the other abbeydwellers encounter the Green Maelstrom at the end of the swift Roaringburn current, which is legendary for taking ships. They swing around the edge of it, [[spoiler:but the pursuing pirate ship isn't so lucky.]]
* ''[[Literature/LandOfOz The Scarecrow of Oz]]'': Cap'n Bill and Trot get pulled into Oz by way of a freak summer maelstrom.
* In ''Literature/TheInheritanceCycle'''s second book ''Eldest'', Roran and the Carvahall villagers are attempting to escape the Empire by sailing to Surda, but are pursued by three sloops. In a desperate attempt to evade the sloops, Roran and Uthar, despite their fear, run through a maelstrom called the Boar's Eye, formed by two opposite tidal currents that go between two islands southwest of the Empire. They succeed in getting through it due to the sheer amount of manpower available on the boat. The sloops... not so much.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* ''Series/{{Mythbusters}}'' tested this. Turns out maelstroms simply ''can't'' get big enough to swallow any reasonably sized ship. In fact, in order to achieve the speed necessary for a true ship-swallowing maelstrom, the water would have to be moving ''faster than the speed of sound.''
* ''Series/OnceUponATime'' used several as portals between worlds.
* In the short-lived science fiction series ''Surface'', one episode had a boat get sucked into a mega-maelstrom that was created by the show's monsters burrowing up into the lake from deep underground.

* [[Myth/ClassicalMythology Charybdis]] is a sea-monster that creates the UrExample. Charybdis lives in a sea-strait, often specified as the Strait of Messina (where tidal whirlpools occur). Thrice a day, Charybdis swallows huge amounts of water and thus creates a maelstrom. After a time, it spits the water out again; afterwards there is a period of calm before Charybdis begins to swallow again.

** In book 3 of ''Literature/TheAeneid'', Aeneas' fleet of Trojan refugees draws near the Strait of Messina with the intent to pass it, when the growing current and a thundering noise make them realize at the last moment that they are approaching the infamous Charybdis. They immediately turn around and row for their lives, and, hours later and utterly exhausted, manage to escape the suction of Charybdis.

* In ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'', [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1823 SCP-1823 ("Rock in a Hard Place")]] is a whirlpool with a variable diameter (1-4 kilometers) that can move between locations at up to 30 kilometers per hour. It hunts down and destroys ships.

* In ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot2CortexStrikesBack'', whirlpools are a common obstacle in the river levels. Get too close into it and you'll be sucked into the river, costing you a life.

* ''VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn'' requires that you sail your ship into one of these to get to the BonusDungeon.
** In ''[[VideoGame/GoldenSunTheLostAge The Lost Age]]'', Lemuria is hidden behind a series of whirlpools and currents (and Poseidon). To get past them, you need to remember a children's song that explains how many times you need to go around each whirlpool.

* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' can use these as a move and several appear on the maps in some games, blocking passages. They're cancelled out by a Mon using the move out of battle.
* A handful of giant whirlpools appear scattered around the Zee in ''VideoGame/SunlessSea''. They impede the ship's movements, pulling them to their center, and cause slow damage to their hull.
* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker'' does then when you fight one of the giant sea octoroks.

* The ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'' universe has the Maelstrom, a massive version of this near the center of the world, created from a well of magic that led to the sundering of a Pangaea-like continent. The Maelstrom helped keep the continent of Kalimdor hidden from the Eastern Kingdoms due to the danger of sailing past it. It has been somewhat tamed since, and the shamans of the world have established a base in the jagged rocks that surround it, but it's still a huge and dangerous whirlpool.

[[/folder]]

* ''TabletopGame/ArsMagica'' is set in a "[[MedievalEuropeanFantasy Mythic Europe]]" where AllMythsAreTrue, so giant whirlpools crop up from time to time. They're ''incredibly'' lucrative sources of certain types of {{Mana}}... all the more so, the closer a mage is willing to get to their deadly core...

* ''Series/{{Mythbusters}}'' tested this. Turns out maelstroms simply ''can't'' get big enough to swallow any reasonably sized ship.

Note that the whirlpool does not have to pose a threat to a large ship to qualify as this trope. It need only be an unrealistically large [[EverythingsBetterwithSpinning swirling]] maelstrom or ''comparatively'' large to one of the characters. A bathtub drain could qualify in a movie about anthropomorphic bugs, for example.

The [[AncientGreece Ancient Greek]] myth of Charybdis makes this trope OlderThanFeudalism.

* ''Anime/DragonBallZ'' made one of these when Freeza was [[spoiler:thought to be dead]].
* In ''OnePiece'', this is actually exploited by the heroes once: Near the end of Enies Lobby arc, Sanji secretly sneaked out of his boat to hijack the control of the giant door on the waters they're on, causing it to slowly shut down and create giant whirlpools and water currents. The big Marine ships have difficulty on navigating through the currents, but the much smaller Straw Hat ship doesn't.

* The eighth episode of ''Anime/PokemonGenerations'' has Kyogre creating these in addition to HostileWeather. The island that Mossdeep City is on gets surrounded by maelstroms the size of cities. Compared to the games, even the remakes, that mostly only imply that the catastrophe would be a Great Flood, this shows that the resulting storm is far more catastrophic than that.

** Additionally, the character Jinbe can be seen standing in a Mega Maelstrom in episode 450.

* ''Wiki/SCPFoundation'': [[Characters/{{SCP Foundation SCPs 1000 And Beyond}} SCP-1823]], [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1823 ("Rock in a Hard Place")]]. SCP-1823 is a whirlpool with a variable diameter (1-4 kilometers) that can move between locations at up to 30 kilometers per hour. It hunts down and destroys ships.