Its raining, its pouring, all the old men with guns are snoring...
Another raining day here in paradise! I tried to motivate yesterday and get a session in before the winds whipped up and got out of control with the pending storm. Meager swell, knee slappers at best, onshore winds and dirty rain water told me it was a bad idea. Days like this make me yern for some surf. The office is slow and not very busy, I have way too much time on my hands and need to get in the water to mellow out. Perfect for some mid day surf at the beach or just chillin in the sun. But, that is not the case this week. Instead, a nice cup of rain and a poo donut....
It also looks like the rain is going to stick around for a bit as well. Weather reports last night mentioned a 10-14 day pattern similar to what we have now. They called it the "pineapple express", pulling warmer air from areas near Hawaii and bringing them northward to collide with cooler air from the north. And of course this is all centered right on top of us. Sweet! Stoked!
Outside, the current conditions look like this:
local wind - 12 mph WSW
sf bouy - 9.2 @ 8 sec.
bouy wind - WSW - SW about 10 knots
rain - likely
poo - highly likely
In world news, there is more on the Tsumani's in Asia. Last night, there was another tsunami warning issued for the coastline of southeastern India. The result of an aftershock within the region. Death toll is well over 120,000 now and it will continue to climb. There are also some pretty horrific home videos showing the wave action as well as the resulting floods which took a lot of lives.
Here are some messages I found off SurferMag:
Aceh Northern Sumatra has been devastated by the Tsunami. TV images are starting to come in from helicopters.... no-one has set foot in the area since the quake. Monster waves demolished everything up to 2 Km inland. The destruction looks more like a Hiroshima than the shocking images we have all seen so far from other areas - No green trees standing, no bright colors anywhere, just mud and destruction. 17 towns on the mainland had populations of over 35,000, but communications are down, no word yet from survivors. The offshore islands had a combined population of maybe 10,000. The entire SW Aceh region has maybe 1 million residents all up and a large proportion live along the coast.
The Indonesian Vice President fears over 25,000 have been killed, with hundreds of thousands homeless.
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"The latest news i got from the local TV in Indonesia is what the people need in Aceh are Volunteers and body bags. I heard in Lhokseumawe 80% of the population has passed away. So tragic. Aceh really-really is totally damaged."
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This is one of the sadest pictures I have seen:
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Check out this shot!
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Sri Lanka
online donations for aid to people affected by the earthquake and tsunami in Asia
Posted by: others in need at December 30, 2004 11:06 AMnytimes link asking me to login, here are some others for people who don't want to go thru the steps for a login (even though it's free)
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/12/28/tsunami.aidsites/index.html
http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/ts/my-pay-page/PX3BEL97U9A4I/104-1212720-0949555
Posted by: j at December 30, 2004 11:25 AMdamn. those pics r crazy! i wonder how high the numbers will go.
jumped in at the beach yesterday. those no swimming signs everywhere, but the wind was good, so i gave in to the temptationg of glassy peelers. fun but a little too weak for my taste.
Posted by: lerm at December 30, 2004 01:20 PMso so dad. Just horrible. Knowing the beating huge lines of whitewater dish out makes those pics all the more scary. And very sad.
Posted by: sad at December 30, 2004 02:09 PManyone know if water quality issues are less of a concern up in mendo-noma? outlook for surf ain't good anyway, but i'm dying to get out, and i will be in sea ranch thru sunday. fewer people = less poo, right?
i'm trying to continue savoring my last session, way back on 12/21 - really fun one for me up on the north end of ob - right tide, sunny, no wind, and a fairly consistent 5 ft 11 sec swell. but as the monkey on my back makes me crabbier & crabbier, i am starting to really regret not having longboarded in ocean city nj on xmas eve, it was offshore and not even that cold...
happy new years peeps!
Posted by: loon at December 30, 2004 02:10 PMloon-
water quality can be comprimised due to agricultural run off. most surf spots in the area will pick up stormy conditions like OB; not much shelter. likely too rough to even ab dive- pretty though.
surfed yesterday at a consistant waist high long board peak & have diarreah today. connection?
saw some crusty regulars, wonder if they have the poos too?
loon, where in oc? my grandparents lived there for 20+ years. i believe right at the summers point bridge. only visited 3-4 times but have some memories of crabbing, miniature golf on the board walk and a really cruddy skatepark... never surfed there, never really saw any waves.
Posted by: goodmorning at December 30, 2004 03:11 PMthanks for the reply goodmorning. i wound up trying out one of the ultra-sharky spots on the way back - spooky but fun, i can see why people risk it. no signs of rain-related impact yet...
and i'm hoping that the risks with agricultural runoff diminishes as the number of continual days of rain increases - yes?
i haven't actually surfed ocean city yet. my wife is from the vineland area so that's just the closest spot. i have surfed summer slop in sea isle - nothing special when i was there. but hey, who can complain when mack & mankos pizza awaits up on the boardwalk...
Posted by: loon at January 3, 2005 10:52 AMthat sequence shot is the craziest ive seen...holy fuck..
happy 2005 niceness..
Posted by: bagel at January 3, 2005 11:48 AMxmas eve = best ########## i've scored with all my friends out
thursday evening = best #### ##### i've ever scored with 2 other guys out
sunday noonish = maybe the best ##### ###### i've ever scored with 0 other guys out
all in all a very happy holidays
Posted by: bbr at January 3, 2005 12:12 PMDitto on bbr's comments.
the week leading up to xmas...nice groundswell fun
xmas eve....amazing solo jetty session at the perfect tide.
last couple days or so, fun fairly big windswell that the southbay loves.
sorry i missed you Korewin, hope you scored some nuggets.
niceness!
Posted by: Hb at January 3, 2005 12:54 PMI'd rather take a chance with ag runoff than untreated city water. Cows don't have hepatitis. When I broke my finger at OB a few years ago, it had a followup nasty infection of some bacteria they hadn't seen before. Took Cipro and Cephlax for months and it just wouldn't go away. The fingernail still won't grow right.
But what really matters if you don't have an open wound is local tides and sand structure. A cove with onshore currents will always be worse than an open beach with strong undertow.
Posted by: Nate at January 3, 2005 01:29 PMNate, all i have is a stoked out feeling that won't go away...oh, and of course, like Tosh, i have this....
went to the doctor
To check out what's matta
yeah i went to the doctor
To find out the matter
doctor said son!
Posted by: Hb at January 3, 2005 02:05 PMyou have a Reggaemylitis
I said,"What?????"
Doctor said son
You have a Reggaemylitis
watching sprout and brewing 5 gallons of beer, oh yeah!
Posted by: j at January 3, 2005 02:14 PMfeliz ano nuevo niceness.
xmas day was sweet but i'm not telling. rode my bike instead of bumming about no surf last week. it was wet, cold, and muddy. no floating poo or vibes from haters. blissful, heart pounding single track lines. old skool caliper brakes keep it real on the descents. a warm bowl passed between wet muddy friends on the side of the trial in pouring rain is paradise minus waves and sun.
donate when you can. pack your trash. increase the peace.
fark work.
Posted by: 3to5setsof7 at January 3, 2005 02:28 PM
Posted by: cadaver at January 3, 2005 02:48 PMSalvador Dali
where's our fearless lEader been?
man....if i could surf like tudor i wouldn't have to work.
Posted by: j at January 3, 2005 04:23 PMOk, the weather models are usual wrong so far in advance, but we could get some interesting weather later in the week.
From NOAA...
Posted by: dano at January 3, 2005 05:40 PM"The notable thing is that the GFS then keeps this pattern in place for about a week. This pattern is capable of producing a serious shot of winter wx in the Pacific NW with cold...snowy conditions even on the W side of the Cascades. Under this scenario CA gets soaked...especially the cntrl and srn parts of the state... While far nrn CA could get snow down to very low elevations. This is a rare pattern. The mrng discussion from pdx mentioned that ncep is comparing the prospective setup to Jan 1950...which saw record cold wx in pdx along with lots of snow (41.4 inches for that month). I dont go back that far but i rode out such a pattern in pdx in jan 1969. Pdx and sea had heavy snow (45.4 inches for the month at sea- tac airport) and a long period of subfreezing temps. The snow depth at Spokane reached 47 inches! CA saw torrential rain...especially in the s. Los Angeles recorded 14.94 inches for Jan 1969...most or all of it in the last half of the month. Many...many feet of snow fell in the sierra. A period of wx with these characteristics up and down the coast only occurs about once every decade or two...in fact the snow total at sea-tac and the rain total at LA have never been matched or exceeded in any month since then. So things will probably turn out to be more benign than the above scenario...but it will be interesting to see what happens."
Last time I saw this pattern was January 1996, it rained 21 straight days. The basic idea is a very strong high forms right over the eastern Aleutian Islands. This crushed the normal jetstream - anything south of the high will be pushed west, not east, by the high pressure winds. so, the jetstream is basically disrupted. The rain we just got was from ONE STORM that tracked from north to south taking an entire week to clear out. No jetstream, storms linger. With the high pressure far enough away from us, we are unprotected, and Thursday it should all start again, another super slow motion storm coming over us. At least we get a coupla days of swell. Check it early Tuesday, and later Wednesday.
And congratulations to the newest member of the niceness crew - a new OB charger welcomed to the fold. Good luck getting sleep.
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