Some look exactly like Hokusai’s famous woodblock wave print. It is amazing how accurate the woodblock really is of such a wave. Note the poor guys in the boat at the bottom of the wave in the woodblock. They say this kind of wave may have been what sank the Edmund Fitzgerald.
What I find fascinating is those going intentionally to a place which regularly produces the most scary looking waves ever – like the jaws of a hungry water monster – and surfing down its evil face…
Shipstern Bluff Wave
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUL8aVet1s8
sing
Testosterone is powerful stuff.
@sing said:
What I find fascinating is those going intentionally to a place which regularly produces the most scary looking waves ever – like the jaws of a hungry water monster – and surfing down its evil face…
About how fast are those surfers traveling?
About 35 mph at the fastest, most in those videos were probably about 20-25 mph. There is a bigwave surfer here on the westcoast who wears GPS watches and publishes the length of ride and speed data. I’ll see if I can find his link of Jaws, Maverkics and Nazare. One thing that limits speed is chatter of the board, big wave surfers have strapped on boards, towed into the wave by jetskis, to keep their feet on the board, and the latest thing is surfing on hydrofoils - since they don’t interact with the bumpy surface, and suck energy from below the wave they can go very very fast … I’m not sure what the fastest surfer speed measured yet is. I have a very fast wave ski that comes up on a plane on big waves and skims; I measured the speed around 23 mph on an overhead wave with GPS, and it was bouncing like crazy, since the water is rotating under you as you surf, the feeling is much higher than 23 mph.
I don’t think it’s so amazing Hokusai painted very realistic monster waves, Japan has been a seafaring nation for thousands of years, and they live on Islands, where coastal travel was the most efficient way to get somewhere without pissing off the local war lords. I used to work with several research groups in Japan and visited often, when I quit that job my Japanese friends gave me a large tapestry of the Hokusai wave as a present. Also not really impressed with modeling to produce a small wave, that confirms huge rogue waves exist. Oral traditions of most seafaring people have described enormous rogue waves, and if you spend much time on the ocean you have experienced small versions.
That I have.
What is significant is understanding how they form. Seems to me they are like a clapotis but the waves have to meet at 120 degrees.
Indeed I feel the same about Hokusai. He had to be a keen observer to get it right, and must have actually seen what he portrayed.
Someday two plates to floor shall slip
from ocean’s basement table,
at obtuse angle crossroad crash
will water color fable,
but lest there be a witness then
observing from on high,
no land nor shipbourne artist live
will brush wave as Hokusai
Thanks, @SeaDart. Gotta be quite the feeling for the skilled, zooming down a wall of water at 25-35 MPH.
I’m not skilled so I’d be terrified.
Very interesting! thanks for posting
Seems like a lot of effort for a very short ride that ends in getting thrashed. I think I’d get bored after a few runs. 
@Sparky961 said:
Seems like a lot of effort for a very short ride that ends in getting thrashed. I think I’d get bored after a few runs.
For sure the underwater ride would be longer… Maybe that’s where the thrill is… Surviving a rollalong a rocky bottom reef?
All in all, I find the study of unwater contours and interaction with energy in the water fascinating in the types of waves created/generated.
sing
@SeaDart said:
About 35 mph at the fastest, most in those videos were probably about 20-25 mph.
I wonder whether this is absolute velocity (relative to ground) or relative velocity (with respect to the water itself). GPS would give the former, the latter is what the surfer and board experience.
@SeaDart said:
Also not really impressed with modeling to produce a small wave, that confirms huge rogue waves exist.
Sorry, I find this statement baffling - did you read the report? The research was carried out to determine how such waves can be created, not whether they exist (their existence is known). This offhand dismissal of important scientific research bothers me.
@carldelo said:
, the latter is what the surfer and board experience.@SeaDart said:
Also not really impressed with modeling to produce a small wave, that confirms huge rogue waves exist.Sorry, I find this statement baffling - did you read the report? The research was carried out to determine how such waves can be created, not whether they exist (their existence is known). This offhand dismissal of important scientific research bothers me.
Because SeaDart won’t say it, he is a phd level scientist. I doubt he is dismissing “scientific research” as much, perhaps, as to say the significance of that linked research is confirming/replicateing what may already be known.
sing
A friend has always scoffed at my claim that I encountered a couple of 15 foot waves when I was surfing alone on Lake Superior in 6 footers. But I know what I saw, and unlike most men I’m a very good estimator of size. I looked back and said “Oh shit” just as this yuuuuge vertical wave hit me. My 9 foot Rip went vertical on the face and I prepared to get clobbered. But something else happened. For a moment I was basically embedded inside the green water, vertical, like an ant preserved in amber. When the wave passed I popped up and out the backside in reverse. Never saw anything like that before or since. Probably never will because I won’t go out in 6 footers anymore.
My Bullshito Meter just pegged off the scale. :o