Monday, December 04, 2006

tech issue + forecast

Thanks everybody for posting info about the videos issue. From what Florian says it seems to be a Safari problem. In the meantime that a patch will be realesed, let's try this.
You guys who can't see the movies, go to my dropshots page and check if you can see them from there.

And please, feedback me with a comment. If it works, from now on, every time I post a video I'll also post the link to the video on dropshots.

By the way, I'm almost done with part four of 11 30, maybe tonight.

In the meantime, let me throw out a forecast.
The north pacific is about to get really, really angry.
This is my fav site for long term forecasts. If you like/understand weather maps (sea level pressure diagrams), check it out.
It's a bit complicated, but not too bad. Instructions:
Click on 'Public charts'
Click on '06 Western Pacific'
in the Chart field select 'sfc istchs/wind slp'
and finally click on 'loop'.
When available (not always!) the weather maps that are modelled to be for the next 6 days will show in an animated fashion.

Remember when a few days ago I said there will a big NW swell around Thursday? Well, now we're getting closer and more charts are available, so, not only I can confirm that, but I can add that the swell will last quite a while.

What I really want to point out though, is the hugeness of the fetch that will dominate the whole north pacific in the few next days. In five years that I'm here, I've never seen such a wide and stationary fetch. It will be mainly oriented towards the west coast of Canada and US, so Hawaii will only get the angular spreading of it.
But I can't wait to watch the internet footage of the huge waves that will hit the tow-in spots in Oregon and California. It's gonna be gigantic. The only risk I see is the onshore wind at the end of the swell (select the area '01 eastern Pacific' for that), but they should have a couple of clean days first. We'll see...

Back to Maui, it's really hard to predict how big an angular spreading will be, so we'll have to wait for the swell to hit to know the size. The bad news (the hard core windsurfers will think I'm crazy) is that the second part of the week will be extremely windy. I'm afraid 4.2 kind of wind. Superstrong wind really disgusts me.
Hopefully from 11am to noon and from 5pm to sunset it will be doable, otherwise I'll just take photos...

As for today, it's windy already and the NW buoy readings at 8am are showing a rapidly increasing NW swell already at 5 feet, 15 sec. The direction (335 degrees) should be north enough for lower Kanaha and that's were you'll find me in the late afternoon to catch the 20 seconds forerunners... If still too small down there, look for me up the coast...

1 comment:

cammar said...

Hi Ben,

I would recommend to search on the net for an explanation of a weather map.
Or, if you are patient, I will post what you ask for later on this week. Let me wait for a significant ACTUAL (the ones you saw are forecasted ones) chart and I'll try to explain how to read it.
Thanks for the idea.

Stoked on biodiesel, uh? Good job. By decreasing the demand on gasoline, maybe you'll save a life of an american soldier who is fighting a war for oil in Asia without even knowing it. Or, even better, you'll save a life of a local civilian.
I know, they are both human beings, but I feel a little more compassioned about who is invaded rather than the imperialistic invaders...