September 12, 2005
9/13
TUESDAY... the north shore awakens from the long summer bummer. surf has been confirmed from a reliable source on the north shore today. surf was building into the 2-4ft range at select spots and may have even gotten larger as the the evening approached. tomorrow will see surf on the north shores peaking near the 5ft range at most spots with possible larger sets. with this being the first swell of the season expect some additional heads in the line-up and also look for discolered water as this will indicated that waves are breaking in that vicinity. surf along southern shores will stay in the 1-3ft range throughout the day. it is unlikely that the new larger south swell will show any scouts by evening as it has just started richtering the equatorial buoy today. wednesday will be another story.
5-DAY OUTLOOK
this is it!!! as my last few reports have revolved around this "supposed to be" south swell i have been biting the nails as to whether or not it would actually happen. i rarely get to amped about south shore surf, but this one if it worked out as planned, would be worthy of a few raised eyebrows. most south swells as a rule always find a way to look great on paper, but the actual packege, when delivered, is usually much smaller, weaker, and nothing like its advertisement. this one however actually got better as the system unfolded. the angle got better and the waves got bigger....thank you.
our story starts last wednesday when a vigirous low pressure system pushed the envolope of weather physics by reaching a whopping 950mb or so in the center. together with a massive low pressure and some nice moist tropical air and a large cold air masss from the antarcticthe system swirled and built giant waves that some think may have reached 50ft in the open ocean. the system was located east of new zealand which for those mysterious south swells is the ideal swell window. from thursday until saturday the storm produced angry seas that, as luck would have it, were pointed mostly in the direction of hawaii. reports are not in yet from tahit...or are they? ...but many tow teams ran from their homes to track this one down and see what was on the menu. my guess is that some people got the rides of their lives and that waves exceeded the 15ft forecast heights. the video should be out in a few months.
the waves have travelled and today started rocking the equatorial buoy (#28). the swell jumped quickly to 10ft which near the eqator means something....mainly that with the usual lack of windswell the groundswell was the the likely culprit. to confirm this there is a device that measure the power of the swells on the buoys these days. most moderate to large north swells will hit 25-40 on the power scale. really giant ones will shoot the thing through the roof and register 130, but those are rare.. most south swells come in at around 12-20 and those are the larger ones. the current reading under buoy 28 is 35! this is the highest i've ever seen on a south swell in the last few years.
the next few days will go something like this. surf will jump rapidly on wednesday crank in the 3-5ft range with larger sets. by thursday surf should peak with sets hitting the 6ft mark and i'm going to say it there may be 8ft sets at spots that really like large south swells so don't think you can't get clobbered by a 8ft on the south shore...it can happen. this swell should last well into the weekend with saturdat seeing leftover 3ft waves for the true warriors to chew on. oh yah there will be some waves on the north shore tomorrow and wednesday, but with this being the first swell of the season i'll let you figure that one out.
Posted by megaprober at September 12, 2005 09:35 PM