That means more time to wait for me. That also mean that the morning calls won't be as early as usual.
There were some fantastic waves to be ridden/photographed in Lahaina, but unfortunately my camera battery was dead, so here's a photo just posted by Dave Kalama (obviously still in Fiji) with a funny caption:
Fiji Air. “ we’ll be flying at an altitude of 2ft. today. You can expect a smooth ride through our cutback with a little turbulence as we rebound off the white water. After that, it’s smooth sailing all the way home. Thank you for flying Fiji air today with a little help from our partners at @gofoil @qbpaddles and @kalamaperformance please enjoy the rest of our flight and bula vinaka.
6am significant buoy readings
South shore
W
3ft @ 14s from 153° (SSE)
SW
3.6ft @ 13s from 165° (SSE)
SE
3.2ft @ 14s from 173° (S)
South swell went down a bit both in size and period, but there should still be plenty waves on the Lahaina side. Up to head high is my guess on the size.
I promised an analysis on the travelling time from Fiji to us, and here it is. I also added it (together with the same table for east of New Zealand) to the epic post Buoys to Maui travel times and Maui's shadow lines.
Fiji to Maui travel time
P S T (days)
11s = 17.16 = 6.8 12s = 18.72 = 6.2 13s = 20.29 = 5.7 14s = 21.84 = 5.3 15s = 23.4 = 5 16s = 24.96 = 4.7 17s = 26.52 = 4.4 18s = 28.08 = 4.1 19s = 29.64 = 3.9 20s = 31.2 = 3.7
The big swell hit Fiji on Hawaii's Saturday May 26 (it was Sunday over there) with a period of 18s. IF the period would stay the same, it would take 4 days for that energy to get here, which means around Wednesday May 30. But the period of a swell increases as the swell travels, so it was probably a bit earlier than that.
That confirms that the actual swell has nothing to do with the big Fiji swell. Some friends reported that around mid week last week there was a swell in Maui, but nothing particularly significant and for sure MUCH smaller than the current one.
Also, the direction of a swell coming from the Tasman Sea would be from 209 to 217, while this one is from 195 (at least in the Surfline forecast), which means from east of New Zealand.
Fortunately, I just remembered I had a glimpse of a Windy.com map posted by Jason Hall on Monday May 28 and went to retrieve it together with the Tasman Sea one I saved on May 22, so that we can compare the fetches in the collage below.
They have comparable winds (around 40 knots), but the Tasman Sea one seems wider to me. What made that one massive for Fiji was the proximity. What made the second one bigger for us is the lack of obstruction. Love these kind of analysis and it looks like I could use a lesson from Jason on how to add text and graphics on a map.
North shore
Pauwela
5.1ft @ 8s from 61° (ENE)
3.3ft @ 5s from 61° (ENE)
Pretty good windswell numbers at the Pauwela buoy, this is the time of the year when Hookipa is very uncrowded and you can score fun surf/windsurf sessions. Up to head high is my guess for over there too.
Wind map at noon.
Just a windswell fetch in the North Pacific.
South Pacific has a great fetch, unfortunately broken in two parts by New Zealand. Couple of feet 15s from the one to the east of it in a week.
Morning sky.
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