New Hurricane Ivan Study Shows It Created 90ft+ Waves!
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New Hurricane Ivan Study Shows It Created 90ft+ Waves!
Last edited by Thunder44 on Thu Aug 04, 2005 3:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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HurryKane wrote:80-90 foot waves are not that unbelievable in open water.
Then what are 80-90 foot waves called then, tidal waves by a HURRICANE!!! Unbelivable so I choose not to bileve. Well if it had 80-90 foot waves wouldn't that make it the strongest hurricane ever because if gillbert had a minimum recorded central pressure of 888 millibars and I'm not sure what Ivan had. whouldn't that meant that possibly if Ivan had 80-90 foot waves then Gillbert would have even bigger waves. Like 120-130 foot waves. What were the recorded waves for gillbert???
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Astro_man92 wrote:HurryKane wrote:80-90 foot waves are not that unbelievable in open water.
Then what are 80-90 foot waves called then, tidal waves by a HURRICANE!!! Unbelivable so I choose not to bileve. Well if it had 80-90 foot waves wouldn't that make it the strongest hurricane ever because if gillbert had a minimum recorded central pressure of 888 millibars and I'm not sure what Ivan had. whouldn't that meant that possibly if Ivan had 80-90 foot waves then Gillbert would have even bigger waves. Like 120-130 foot waves. What were the recorded waves for gillbert???
As I understand, the whole point of the article that hurricanes in general may generate much larger waves then previously thought when they are out in open water. You would hear about these monstrous waves as just being "rouge waves", but this study shows they may actually be more common in hurricanes. These are not tsunamis. They never reach the shore this high.
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My brother was on a Navy Ship in the Gulf back in 1969 and had to go through part of Hurricane Camille. It was still a couple hundred miles from the coast. They estimated ocean swells to be about 50-60 feet high.
I don't know how Camille compares to Ivan with regards to windfield which can have alot to do with the swell height I think. Anyway, just thought I would throw that out there.
I don't know how Camille compares to Ivan with regards to windfield which can have alot to do with the swell height I think. Anyway, just thought I would throw that out there.
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Astro_man92 wrote:HurryKane wrote:80-90 foot waves are not that unbelievable in open water.
Then what are 80-90 foot waves called then, tidal waves by a HURRICANE!!! Unbelivable so I choose not to bileve. Well if it had 80-90 foot waves wouldn't that make it the strongest hurricane ever because if gillbert had a minimum recorded central pressure of 888 millibars and I'm not sure what Ivan had. whouldn't that meant that possibly if Ivan had 80-90 foot waves then Gillbert would have even bigger waves. Like 120-130 foot waves. What were the recorded waves for gillbert???
Wave height is determined by wind speed, duration of that wind speed in a given location, and "fetch" (distance the wind is blowing the same direction over the water.)
It's not purely a function of windspeed. A plain-old winter noreaster with 50 mph winds produced higher waves than Hurricane Andrew did at its peak, for example; a winter noreaster is a much wider storm with a much longer fetch of winds. Andrew was a tiny storm, and the wind didn't blow the same direction at 150+ mph over a long distance.
The famous "Perfect Storm" produced comparable waves to Ivan even though it's max winds were much, much lower than Ivan.
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Jim Cantore
"The waves are about 600 feet long and there are ships out there that are that long," Mitchell said. "If the wave is under the ship, with a crest in front and a crest in back, there is nothing supporting the middle," he added.
"The chances of a ship surviving something like that are not good."
You can say that again! Amazing article.
"The chances of a ship surviving something like that are not good."
You can say that again! Amazing article.
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My father was in the Coast Guard and one storm they were "trying" to penetrate the eye of had them going through (what he estimated) 50-70 foot seas, so I can see 90+ with a severe TC.
I say "trying" because they ended up going backwards 300 miles with the ship at full ahead. There were meterologists on board who wanted to try to go in the storm.
I say "trying" because they ended up going backwards 300 miles with the ship at full ahead. There were meterologists on board who wanted to try to go in the storm.
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I remember reading that some of the highest seas in the world are in the very southern latitudes between Antarctica and the southern tip of South America (the Drake Passage) or Africa, where the trade winds can essentially blow constantly all the way around the world unhindered by land. Anyone know if there's truth to that?
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Derecho wrote:Astro_man92 wrote:HurryKane wrote:80-90 foot waves are not that unbelievable in open water.
Then what are 80-90 foot waves called then, tidal waves by a HURRICANE!!! Unbelivable so I choose not to bileve. Well if it had 80-90 foot waves wouldn't that make it the strongest hurricane ever because if gillbert had a minimum recorded central pressure of 888 millibars and I'm not sure what Ivan had. whouldn't that meant that possibly if Ivan had 80-90 foot waves then Gillbert would have even bigger waves. Like 120-130 foot waves. What were the recorded waves for gillbert???
Wave height is determined by wind speed, duration of that wind speed in a given location, and "fetch" (distance the wind is blowing the same direction over the water.)
It's not purely a function of windspeed. A plain-old winter noreaster with 50 mph winds produced higher waves than Hurricane Andrew did at its peak, for example; a winter noreaster is a much wider storm with a much longer fetch of winds. Andrew was a tiny storm, and the wind didn't blow the same direction at 150+ mph over a long distance.
The famous "Perfect Storm" produced comparable waves to Ivan even though it's max winds were much, much lower than Ivan.
Interesting point about the "Perfect Storm". The last days of October 1991, the biggest surf in any surfers memory here along the Central Florida Coastline courtesy of that storm. As far away as it was, it brough 15-20 foot swells to the beaches of Brevard County. No passing Hurricane has ever come close to generating waves that size ( along the beaches). A couple with very large windfields such as Isabel ( 2003 ),Floyd ( 1999) and Luis ( 1995 ) caused fairly large swells, but nothing even close to the Perfect Storm.
Last edited by EDR1222 on Fri Aug 05, 2005 12:20 am, edited 1 time in total.
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