Waves are definitely on the brain - Waves of COVID, waves to truck convoys, waves of democracy. It is waves in nature that got my attention yesterday.
A rogue wave in B.C. was covered by the weather network news. It is a record-breaking wave that was measured November 17 2020 and has since been determined to be the biggest rogue wave ever measured on the Canadian west coast. It was 17.6 m tall - that's a four story building. You can see the spike on the chart below. This is a once in 1300 years occurrence.
The same article said that on the other side of Canada, waves produced during 2004's Hurricane Ivan rose to more than 28 metres tall and one in particular was 30 m. That's an 8 storey building. Here's the chart of the BC rogue wave.
This famous painting - the Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusi is considered to be an example of a large rogue wave.
I went looking for the biggest wave in recorded history - it is a tsunami wave. That is different than a rogue wave. It was recorded July 9 1958 in Alaska and reached 1,720 feet high - the comparison given in the article is the Empire State Building which is 1,250 feet tall. The wave was caused by an earthquake - it is known as the Lituya Bay Tsunami.
"As the giant mountain of water started traveling across the entire length of the T-shaped Lituya Bay, it reached a peak height of 1,720 feet (524 meters) near the Gilbert Inlet and destroyed everything around. Soil, plants, and trees were snapped off, and the shorelines were completely obliterated."
While the Alaska wave was caused by a tsunami, the 2020 BC wave was a rogue wave. Rogue waves are considered sneaker waves. They don't seem to have a single distinct cause, but occur where physical factors such as high winds and strong currents cause waves to merge and then create a single exceptionally large wave.
Here are my little waves on the Lake Ontario Shore.
In Florida, shells are everywhere - in the asphalt, the cement. Of course, they are on the beach. Here are a few encrusted in brick and cement where we go for a walk. This is the inland waterway side - one can see it is calmer and has piers for boats. The ocean side is a torrent of waves and tides, so is clear beach as far as one can see.
