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May 16, 2005
late season north swells
5/17
TUESDAY...surf is on the rebound for northern shores as tomorrow it will bottom out in the head high range and possibly start to climb back up overnight. for the day however expect waves in the 3ft range solid with some leftover sets. winds will be similar to how they were today with typical trades inthe 10-20mph range. southern shores will be small to tiny and remain that way for most of the week.
new late season north swells are on the way!!!
the fist is a swell due to arrive tomorrow from a storm source that formed in the nortwest pacific and moved rapidly into the gulf of alaska. as it transgressed it set up a captured fetch about 1500nm out that will produced waves just below the 20ft threshold. given the travel time and the short duration of the captured fetch waves are not modeled to get mucharger than the 5ft range. one of the key aspects of this system was that its strongest area of wave production was aiming just north of hawaii and thus the largest waves will travel just north of hawaii. expect waves to arrive on wednesday in the 3-5ft range out of 320deg with the occasional 6ft set at select reefs that favor theses types of swells. my guess is that this swell will not be overly consistent as we are only receiving athe edge of the main swath of waves.
the next storm in the series is looking to be a much larger more winterlike system. this system will begin taking form on thursday and then rapidly organize on friday into a fairly larger and compact system typical of the winter time north pacific. winds will speed up to 55mph and remain so for nearly 18hrs. seas are expected to reach near 30ft in the 345deg band which is very favorable for hawaii and with the close proximity of only 1200nm this swell should reach the 10ft catagory and be large enough to excite some of the outer reefs. as the storm passes to the north winds will remain favorable and the swell will swing more northerly by late sunday into monday.
from the models now the call is for an abrupt rise on early sunday morning with waves in the 6-8ft range with some sets near the 10ft mark. winds may cooperate for us surfers as again as the storm passes north the large north pacific high pressure cell should break down and that means light winds. a last blast of winter no doubt on the menu!!!
Posted by megaprober at May 16, 2005 08:17 PM