We are going to have a mix of SSW swells, local windswell, and building tropical swell from Hurricane Hernan showing over the next couple of days.
Saturday will be mostly a mix of the SSW energy and local windswell. It will still be playful as the latest SSW'er continues to peak. Most spots will hold in the knee-waist high+ range while the standout S facing breaks see some chest-shoulder high+ faces rolling through at times.
Late in the evening we will start to see some minor SE tropical swell from the first stages of Hernan (back when he was still a tropical depression) start to slowly filter in. I am not expecting much of a change in size but there may be a little more consistency as the energy blends into the mix.
Sunday morning will also be pretty similar to Saturday with lots of waves in the waist-chest high range and the top spots in the chest-shoulder high+ range. The tropical S-SE swell from Hernan will continue to build throughout the day and should start to peak late in the afternoon (and will hold overnight into Monday). There will be some head high (maybe even head high+) waves at the top S-SE hurricane swell spots (mostly North Orange County) as this swell starts to peak.
Winds look very similar to what we have seen over the last couple of days. Mostly light and variable winds in the morning with a few areas that will have some light onshore bump...not enough to blow it out...but expect a little bit of funky chop. Afternoon winds on both Saturday and Sunday will be out of the W-NW around the 10-15 knot range.
I think that the morning session is going to be where it is at this weekend...conditions will be clean, the tides will generally be on the low side, and the full crowd won't have descended on the beach. It does look like it is going to be pretty warm inland over the weekend so expect parking, blackball, and crowd issues as everyone starts looking for the coast to cool them off. I don't think that it will be worth driving very far for surf over the weekend either...try and stick with the fun waves close to home for Sat/Sun...Monday may be worth driving a little further as the hurricane swell hits a bit better.
Finally here is a little view of the current swell mix...it will be like this over the weekend...just a little bigger.
Have a great weekend!
7 comments:
Hernan is now Cat 2 as of 6am Sat.
Now Cat-3, as of 8:10AM Pacific Time, reported by The Weather Channel.
Yes, you can check here:
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/index.shtml?epac
or here:
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/atcf_web/index1.html
for details and latest updates. Here's the latest - looks like we might actually get some waves:
HURRICANE 09E (HERNAN) WARNING NR 012
02 ACTIVE TROPICAL CYCLONES IN EASTPAC
MAX SUSTAINED WINDS BASED ON ONE-MINUTE AVERAGE
---
WARNING POSITION:
091200Z --- NEAR 15.5N 122.8W
MOVEMENT PAST SIX HOURS - 295 DEGREES AT 08 KTS
POSITION ACCURATE TO WITHIN 010 NM
POSITION BASED ON CENTER LOCATED BY SATELLITE
PRESENT WIND DISTRIBUTION:
MAX SUSTAINED WINDS - 100 KT, GUSTS 125 KT
Gotta love how slow Hernan is moving as well. Its trajectory is currenty W/WNW @ 9mph which is a good speed for sending its fetch out in our direction.
Sunday night/Monday morning might be a very decent time for waves at this rate (keeps fingers crossed)
Had a fun session at Imperial Beach today. The water was clean and there were consistent 4 foot lefts north of the pier all morning until high tide kicked in.
how soon can we in socal expect some NW action? I know they typically start in fall, but is there a science to when the begin popping? these weak South swells are killin me.
-Trapped in HELL AYE
Funny you should mention NW swells...there is actually a new low that is forecast to spin up and intensify just under the Aleutians and move into the lower edge of the Gulf of Alaska in the next 72 hours.
If it pulls together correctly NorCal should have its first semi-significant NW swell arriving around the 15-16th...SoCal will be pretty shadowed (since the swell is a pretty steep NW) but a little of the NW'er will bleed into the winter spots around the 16-17th.
It ain't much but at least it is showing the potential for something better to spin to life up there in the NPAC. Cross your fingers that the West Pacific gets a lot of typhoons...we start to see a lot stronger W-NW swells as those tropical systems help to intensify the activity in the colder west-to-east storm track to the north.
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