Big Swells
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Big Swells
Just curious as to how often the east coast of aus would experience massive swells of over 20ft? Maybe the old timers can recall the last time something like this occur? What would be needed weather wise in our region for such an event to occur, ben?
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- charger
- Posts: 963
- Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2004 7:35 pm
- Location: Tweed Coast
Large East Coast swells are generated by either East Coast Lows or Tropical Cyclones (or a significant Tasman Low if it's positioned favourably). These are much different to the swell generating systems of the Southern Ocean, and therefore require a different set of circumstances to evolve favourably for us to receive large swells. That is, they need to to be near-stationary for a couple of days and surface wind speeds need to be very strong. Also, as these systems usually occur as "one-off" events, we're much more likely to see waves in this size range if the swell source (ie the low) is located very close to the coastline. Unfortunately, this usually results in a lot of rain and windy conditions at the same time.
Compare this to WA - they're on track for a potential 20' swell later next week (Fri/Sat), but the primary swell generating system is expected to originate several thousand kilometres away. However, the key difference here is that several strong frontal systems are likely to precede the main low in the 3-5 days prior, so the ocean will already be very "active", thus requiring less effort to generate very large wave heights.
Compare this to WA - they're on track for a potential 20' swell later next week (Fri/Sat), but the primary swell generating system is expected to originate several thousand kilometres away. However, the key difference here is that several strong frontal systems are likely to precede the main low in the 3-5 days prior, so the ocean will already be very "active", thus requiring less effort to generate very large wave heights.
Last edited by thermalben on Sat Sep 24, 2005 1:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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- charger
- Posts: 963
- Joined: Sun Jan 11, 2004 7:35 pm
- Location: Tweed Coast
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