Friday, February 24, 2017

2 24 17 morning call

Yesterday the waves at Hookipa had a seriously bad shape. In the morning I called it a 3 from the cliff, but when I surfed it, it felt more like a 1.5. Things improved a bit at sunset, but not by much. Check how irregular is the lip line of this left. I took this photo from the car since it wasn't even worth getting out for a photo shoot, let alone surfing it.


Well, that's also because I had just had some windsurfing foiling action earlier in the harbor. This time it went even better than Sunday and that's because the wind was much more manageable. Below are the graphs of the iWindsurf "Kanaha" sensor for both days. They should really call it "Harbor east pier", 'cause that's where it is. I only had like 40 minutes before the wind (as predicted by the MC2km maps) got just a tad too light.

This time I had a 5.8 sail and I could pump the foil up on a plane pretty much anytime I wanted. Once lifted, I managed to stay up there for a maximum of 5-6 seconds before the thing inevitably did a controlled mini-willie and stopped. Too much weight on the back foot as blog reader Garrett suggested in a comment after Sunday's post, I need to learn to keep the foil leveled once up. But the most important thing is that now I know the kind of conditions that are best for learning and I only had a couple of non dangerous falls. I'm still convinced that this is the best way of learning.

Yesterday's wind graph. Could have used a couple of more mph's.


Just for (my) reference, this is the graph of Sunday when instead I had a 4.0 and it was quite a bit more challenging. Obviously.


4am significant buoy readings
South shore
Lanai
1.4ft @ 13s from 282° (WNW)     
1.2ft @ 9s from 196° (SSW)                      
0.5ft @ 20s from 225° (SW)
The first reading is the wrap of the current NW swell and the last might the one of the new rising one. In the end, you still need to check the webcams. Barbers buoy is down, btw.

North shore
NW101
4ft @ 8s from 88° (E)
2.9ft @ 5s from 57° (ENE)
2.6ft @ 12s from 328° (NW)
1.8ft @ 17s from 45° (NE)

NW001
3.6ft @ 13s from 349° (NNW)           
3.6ft @ 8s from 91° (E)
2.5ft @ 6s from 86° (E)
1.9ft @ 18s from 341° (NNW)
 
Reading the buoys sometimes requires some serious interpretation/knowledge. Normally I clean up those readings and leave only the "significant" ones for you guys, but this time I need them all for explanation purposes. Don't forget that those two buoys are sitting very close to each other.

The 12-13s readings are the current NW swell that is now on its way down. The sub 8s easterly readings are windswells. The 17-18s readings are the start of a new swell. The reason for those unmatching directions is that the buoys are subject to other energies and oscillations and the detection of the correct direction will only happen when this swell will grow in size and be predominant.
I'm gonna push this concept even further and declare that, based on my years of observations, ALL of those directions are not 100% correct (whatever 'correct' means, considering that the wave trains of a swell always has a range of directions, not only one), since they all influence each other. Only if there's a single swell in the water, the direction indication becomes more reliable.
 
Hanalei
3.3ft @ 13s from 319° (NW)
 
Waimea
3.5ft @ 14s from 329° (NW)
 
Pauwela
4.1ft @ 9s from 79° (ENE)
3.4ft @ 14s from 333° (NNW)
2.5ft @ 11s from 337° (NNW)
 
None of the NW exposed local buoys shows signs of the new swell yet. But by applying GP's rule of thumb for the travelling time in its last and final version (I swear I'm not gonna change it again.. I might have to chisel it out on a rock at Hookipa...) 16h at 16s plus/minus 1's for different periods, those 2f 18s at the NW001 buoy should reach Maui at 4am + 14h = 6pm.
Keeping in mind that that 2f at the NW buoy will be less locally because of the decay due to the travelling and to possible refractions, and that the period slightly increases with the travelling, the WW3 output is quite in line with that, as it proposes 1.5f 20s at that time instead.

In other words, there should be some energy from the new swell at sunset overlapping to the old one.
Old one that is on its way down instead, as the Pauwela graph below shows. The light blue line seems to have peaked around sunset yesterday, but 3-4f 14s are still a fun size to play with. The quality of the waves will depend on the local wind and on the interaction with the windswell that is still up to 4f 9s unfortunately.
 
NAM3km map at 7am shows some possibly nice conditions on the north shore.


MC2km maps not updated yet at this time (check them later for the most reliable wind predictions), here's the 10 days Windguru table (link n.16 og GP's meteo websites list on the right) that shows two things of interest:
1) today the wind should be around 15mph from a direction around 60 degrees. Not the best for windsurfing (ideal direction for the north shore is around 75), definitely not the best for surfing either.
2) A wonderful (from the surfer's point of view, of course) start of the month of March.


Current wind map shows:
1) distant WNW fetch that is going to move north
2-3) I talked about those two forming fetches yesterday. So far the wind speed is pretty mild, so nothing major generated yet
4) I see it, I circle it. But I would not expect much out of this southerly fetch, seen how light the wind in it is.

2 comments:

(Ben) Jamin Jones said...

>>They should really call it "Harbor east pier", 'cause that's where it is.
I'm guessing you haven't noticed but recently they renamed the old "Kanaha" sensor to "Kahului Harbor Jetty" (which they also call Kanaha West on the Maui map) and added a new sensor which they now properly call Kanaha.

Kahului Harbor JettyKahului Harbor Jetty:
http://www.iwindsurf.com/windandwhere.iws?regionID=158&siteID=235
Kanaha:
http://www.iwindsurf.com/windandwhere.iws?regionID=158&siteID=7994

They mention that the new kanaha sensor is wireless meaning they don't have to hardwire some kind of internet connection. Probably makes it much easier to site these things. They don't call out exactly where this new thing is, but from the map it appears to be near if not on the waste facility.

cammar said...

Hi Ben,
if they called the sensor Kanaha for years and it was down at the harbor, that doesn't mean that the new "Kanaha" sensor is closer to Kanaha.
There's two wind sensors at the end of both harbor piers and I believe those are the two sensors called "Kanaha west" and "Kanaha". They are the harbor entrance distance away from each other. Cheers.