How big? Guess the size of the wave
Furious arguments broke out in the Swellnet office this morning while we were admiring today's Wave of the Day. The photo, taken by Sam Ross, shows Mikey Brennan standing at the base of a thick Shipsterns Bluff beast (see also image above). It would seem a simple task of measuring the height of the wave, yet we've all come up with different results.
Craig, cool pony that he is, has calculated the smallest figure, while Ben, the voice of reason, is somewhere above him. Me, I'm looking like an hysterical overcaller 'cos the size I gave is greater than theirs. I'm sticking with it though.
We'd like to hear all your answers: What do you think the size of today's Wave of the Day is? There's no right or wrong answer but we'll draw a prize at random - one copy of Visions of the Breaking Wave - at 5pm today.
Comments
25ft face so roughly 13ft from the back
I am going to call it 18ft of Southern grunt.
15feet from back of wave, 13feet thick.
gnarly wave.
4 times overhead = 12ft
I'd say 15/16 ft. But someone should get some scales out and weigh brennans balls
I calculated same as munkima before seeing his comment. 4 times overhead from base of wave to top of roof of barrel (precise measurement assisted by use of my fingernail on iPhone). Therefore 4x6ft = 24ft face. The way I learnt to estimate wave height in south oz would therefore make this a 12 foot wave (measuring the back of the wave, usually considered to be half the height of the wave face).
Agreed paulharder! I notice metric measurement being used a bit more lately. In this case I suppose it is measurement of wave face height. Ie bureau of met would measure trough to peak. Therefore a 24 ft face would be 7.32 metres.
I reckon 22.6foot with a 14foot thick lip.
I recon 15'.
I recon its 2 Eddie's or 3 Laird's depending on your scale.
Either way the lad has figs the size of watermelon.
I'm guessing 20 ft.
I'd say 10 - 12 by the local scale, but you can't equate height with heaviness. How about you measure lip thickness, or better yet a waveheight to lip thickness ratio. 16ft thick lip plus about 20 ft of face (by my arbitrary mouse pointer calculation method).
36/16=2.25
So I'd say it is a 36ft 2.25:1 Monster.
Incidentally,there is an inversely proportional relationship between the ratio and bloody carnage/Schadenfreude potential. As the ratio nears 1:1, Death, maiming and the interest of mainstream media becomes a certainty.
10-12 ft.
About 3 and a half times crouched body height, halve and add a bit for Shippies 'cause the lip is a third the wave height, adjust to iggy scale, there is no 11, 13 or 14 foot wave, and it ain't quite there for 15 ft.
10-12 ft - all very scientific. :-)
27ft.
8ft Hawaiian brah
lol @ 3 Lairds!
20 foot on takeoff is my call.
Looks about 10ft or 12ft but it is hard to tell if the wave jacked when it hit the ledge.
Yep...
I agree with the 3 Lairds call... and that Lip is 2 Lairds Fat!!
Is this a trick question, because he's probably 2 feet below sea level?
I'll say 15 feet high or 17 feet including the undersuck. Half of that is lip.
Using my vernier calipers I measure Mickey to be 17mm(slightly crouched),top of the wave to the flats(wave height)is about 85mm.Wave is therefore 5 times height of crouched surfer,roughly.If this is a 10'-12' wave,rider is about 2'-2.2' tall.Very impressive surfing from such a tiny man,how big is his board of choice?
No trick question, Atticus. There are, however, tricky answers (see dellabeach).
Half the size of the one that guy broke his back on....
Too big for this lifetime maybe the next .............
I'd say 16ft
big waves are measured in increments of fear however as there is no official increment size I'm calling 10-12 foot
Ask Blasphemy!
Jake: "big waves are measured in increments of fear however as there is no official increment"
There's not? I'd give that wave about a 35 'fear' rating. Maybe more.
Well, gather round kids I want to tell you a story.............
In Hawaii this would be an 8-10 foot wave, if it was in Australia it would be 12-15ft, if it was at your local break you'd call it 15-20ft and if that was you riding it you'd be calling it 25ft. If you were on it, it would feel like 30ft and if lands on you it'd feel like a swimming pool.
That's a 15 footer, why call it 13 or 16 feet? At that size the wave can pitch and lurch a couple of feet each way so I reckon being that specific at that height is a bit useless. I think wave heights should be measured as (all in feet):1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (maybe), 6, 8, 10, 12, 15, 18, 20, 25, 30 etc. Every wave could comfortably fit in one of those categories.
I don't think describing wave heights has anything to do with 'back of wave' or 'face height' anymore, we just get used to seeing a wave and knowing it fits into one of the descriptive heights I listed above.
Oh, measuring in metres doesn't do it for me (I'm Australian).
12 to 13 ft.
Is Craig a cool pony or a pool pony?
MMM ...Considering the 9' lip makes up half the wave, it 18' or 6 meters.
If that was my wave I'd be telling everyone who wasn't there it was 15-foot of solid Fluffytonka action.
12 to 15
i'd call it about 12 foot, and it's about as big as any keg i've ever seen ( go unridden ) on the south coast of NSW - though i would deduct about 50% of the hoot volume for his effort since he almost certainly towed into it, and if it were much smaller i'd suggest he leave the ski at home.
I dont know about measuring the wave from the back, just gotta look at chopes, 2ft from the back, triple overhead from the front?? The wave in question is what id call at least a solid 12ft + After a couple frothies, the dude with the brass nuts (if he paddled in) would be forgiven for calling it a 15ft bomb. In my opinion.
The wave is already breaking/broken so it's a hard call from that shot. Really need a few frames before to see how high the lip was before it broke. Based on that pic I'd say 10-12ft, but imagining it a few frames beforehand then it could easily be 12ft+ IMO.
8 - 10 foot face with 5 - 6 foot of lip = 13 - 16 foot total.
Or 2.1 to 2.666 Laird's.
12 -15ft...have been trying to compare it to one that laurie towner paddled into a few years back, andy irons called him into it and said it was 15ft hawaiian,very similiar looking . can we get a size from any of the guys in the water or on the boat? the riders opinion on the size would be good, can someone phone mr brennan........
just enlarged the pic, he still has another 3ft before he is at the bottom of that beast...?
If F is Face size, N is the number of times the body can fit up the face then this wave is FN Big!
24ft face, halve it to be macho, so 12ft is the call. Easy for me to say sitting on my fat arse at a desk behind a computer-heavier than anything I have surfed!
Yah all wrong. I'm a surfer and an engineer. Your physics/science teacher would tell you that wave height (or amplitude) is the average of (in this case) the front and back of the wave. Lets say front is 24 ft and back is 12 ft, then the wave is the 18 ft high. Hawaiians measure the back of the wave - why ? Ya sure don't surf the back of the wave and its just plain wrong anyway.
Alternatively its triple overhead.........
Victor, here's a photo of Laurie's wave: https://www.surfersvillage.com/img/st/LaurieTowner5-news.jpg
Hawaiians don't measure the back of the wave, thats' the biggest crock ever.
You can't get anything like an accurate call on the backwards sloping wall of a breaking wave, particularly a slab/ledge reef like Chopes, Shippies or even Waimea.
That old chestnut should be taken to the glue factory.
6
You wanna double that Rat-race? This is your only chance!
Victor: good call on the obvious, ask people that were there haha.
Cliftonben: got a laugh out of me.
Someone needs to put all this 'back of the wave' & 'Hawaiians' rabble to bed...
4 pounds of ballbag converts to a good 20ft..... do we include the portion of wave below sea level?
12-15 I reckon.
Pretty awesome.
I reckon 18 ft - Nice little knee slapper by Mr. Brennan
It's 3.4cm on my 'puter screen.
At first glance I estimated 10-12ft, maybe a little bigger.
Turns out the wave is approximately 4.5 times head height (we measured via Photoshop). With a slight crouch, I reckon Mikey is probably 5ft high. He's very close to the bottom of the wave too - not perfectly, but no more than a foot off I reckon. That's about 23ft from trough to crest, give or take.
So, in 'surfers feet' this would equate to around 12-15ft, which upon close inspection is probably more accurate. I think my initial estimate favoured the inside curve of the wave - ie the 'wave face height', which due to the enormously thick lip, is way out of proportion for the overall height of the wave.
Mikey is crouched at what I'd guestimate as 5 foot, and the wave would be about 3 times that height (ie triple overhead or 15 feet).
I agree with the scale @klm suggests above. Bottom line, it's way bigger than I'd venture out into - ever!
Only posted for a chance to win something free anyway.
Ive ridden heavier waves at point impossible
Christ, now that Laurie's wave has been brought back up who cares about the above discussussion!
< a href= "https://laurietowner.com/following/postswithcomments#laurietowner.com/Th…">
6' tops. (j/ks)
More seriously using a Similar method to thermalben (but in paint) I got 4.5 surfers from the tip of his board to the top of his hand... Likely close to 6' --
27 true feet and 15' surfers.
i reckon about 20ft face
Proof
https://plus.google.com/photos/112129807127913503391/albums/57489563920…
Actually, we got the same result (4.5x times head high) using the same methodology, except (1) we took Mikey as being at the bottom of the wave at the time the photo was taken (IMO, you've moved him into a small below-sea-level depression) and (2) your cropped Mikeys are not actually correct - the bottom of each crop is just below the nose of the surfboard, not the bottom of his front foot - so there's almost an extra foot or so per Mikey!
Jeez, I'm a pedantic bastard.
OK 5pm, entries have closed for the book (though you're welcome to keep commenting). Due to the amount of comments we're gonna give out two additional prizes - DVD copies of Fighting Fear and also Way of the Ocean.
Cliftonben scores Visions of the Breaking Wave.
Superdonyoungy a copy of Fighting Fear and blow-in-9999 a copy of Way of the Ocean.
I'll get in contact with each of you soon or shoot an email containing postage details to: 9tuart@swellnet.com.au
FWIW although there's no right or wrong answer, Craig 'the pool pony ' went for 10'-12', Ben went for 12'-15' or 23' literal feet, trough to crest. I thought it was at least 15' surfers feet and 25' when measuring trough to crest.
...if 1.5 cm equates to the surfer being 6' tall,then i guess its about 30'+,or about 27 feet bigger than the surf that we get in Mackay,North Queensland !!!
I reckon we've gotta start using more than just the height when we talk about waves. (well, we do already don't we)
Its massively important to add the description of the way it's breaking, how thick it is bit. Calling your mates & telling them to get here, it's 6ft, is kinda like calling your mates from a pub & telling em to get here quick cause there's a 6ft chick they really need to see.
That said, as in the height only counts for a small part of the description, I always go for the actual wave face height, including the lip when it's a wave like this.
I reckon what we are trying to call is the energy we can see traveling through the ocean...
2 maybe 3 foot.
Interesting comments by all .
If we presume this was taken Thursday ? . Then the Cape Sorell wave buoy said that the Swell that day was between 3m (Significant) and 6m ( maximum ) . I would also presume taht this wasn't THE largest wave of the day ??? . Then you would take a 1m or 1.5m off the Height as Shippies doesn't receive the FULL open swell unless its more SSW .
So going on this the swell in which the wave Lurched and sucked out of , it was ( 4-4.5M / 12-15ft ) . The face obviously is contorted with atleast 4 ft of below sea level suck and a 6 ft Lip . SO call it what ya want ...
Like someone else above the Ratio of suck out and lip is close to 3/4 . So pretty Heavy . Another interesting point is , don't show the rider the photo . ANd ask him how big it felt from his prospective . Usually when it's this big , I've noticed that it doesn't seem as big . Perhaps thats the scale of looking out rather than looking in !
The main question I had was did he make it or not??
According to Sam who took the pic he did!!!
@Stunet
Not fair to US contestants! I just got online an hour ago to find your contest closed.
What happened to the Global community thingy we're supposed to believe in?
OH! the wave size looks to be about 15' face and probably a 6' back.
Like most here I seriously doubt I would ever attempt one of those, but it would be fun to watch/photograph from the safety of a boat. If the captain is qualified.
as a wave size guide i recommend review of bells 2011, parko calls it "solid 8-foot" , i hear hes caught a few waves in hawaii too- this looks about twice (at least) the size so im going 16
I intentionally left a bit more and took that into account when I did my surfer height (a full 1' higher). I think you are right about my bottom surfer being too far down, however I don't mikey has fully bottom ou in the picture tho.
12 foot if you re from the south. 100 foot if you're a queenslander.
12-14' but where the hell is the face of the wave, its all lip ... or about to be !
6
Inches at the back
Meters at the front
Interesting reports from Fiji. Official ASP call (via the press release) is that the surf at Cloudbreak is 8-10ft and building. On the other hand, commentators on the webcast are calling it 20-25ft.
Obviously, one is measuring in 'surfers feet' and one is measuring 'wave face' - but there really should be some consistency across the board when broadcasting information from one event.
Hi guys, brand new member here but not new to SNet.
Anyway I might approach this a little differently, its a impressive size made more so by the mutant lip..... Makes me think that maybe another factor plays a big part in measuring mutant waves with lips like thicker than your average family home. So I am just wandering how many tons of water are hanging over this blokes head? Yeah its a bloody decent sized wave but what impresses me is the shear top heaviness of waves like this. And its about to throw all its got on the shelf beneath.
Cheers guys
Nick
Welcome Mikolaj,
Seeing as 1 cubic metre of water weighs approximately a ton, I would say there's around a Mack Truck worth of weight bearing down on him, and this is what makes it so heavy.
I would hate to be hit in the head by a lip that side, let alone strapped in with the ankles and legs being the pivot point!
It is in the 18-20 feet "face" range where he stands. That is wave height where he stands. He is crouched so about 5-5.5' - near 4 times him is the face height. With a wave like this it sucks up so the back is probably only about 4-6' - can't measure it that way.
4-6' not "
Haha is Stu from the Goldy or what? Pretty simple equation, head high=wave 2ft, 2ft(5xoverhead)=10ft+
Haha is Stu from the Goldy or what? Pretty simple equation, head high=wave 2ft, 2ft(5xoverhead)=10ft+
Simple equation, eh MP? The 50 dissenting commenters above you would say otherwise.
Three things we learnt from this exercise:
1) Everyone thinks judging wave height is easy.
2) Hardly anyone agrees on wave height. But,
3) Everyone thinks they are right.
And no I'm not from the Goldy!
Lovely Gallery of Kongs Island by Dekort Stu... I've surfed there a few times, magic place.. the left breaking over coral is very Indo like...
Yeah, but were you wearing star trunks and did you eat from the magic cream puff tree?
Can't see a photo of the joint without the earth shaking and "KONG!" ringing in my ears.
And Chappy.
He likes to bite ankles...
@ Stu Ha...No Cream Puffs. and my Scalloped Quik Boardies are but a polishing Rag Nowadays... but I can guarantee you the Paddle back to M beach is Very Sharky...
@ Zen actually a mate of mine Gringo, another Sunny Coast Stalwart was talking to Chappy recently and apparently he has knee probs and isnt Surfing.
I have a classic photo of Kong & Chappy circa 80's with the Thompson Twins in a Warung in Bali...
Wow! As in the 'hold me now, warm my heart' Thompson Twins? Classic.
I think Chappy became a plasterer if I'm not mistaken Joe?
I've surfed M beach dozens of times, but never had the wantons to do the paddle. I reckon I've paddled the Seaway at least a couple of hundred times but the paddle out to OW Is. is another story.
'Warm my heart' is it? Shit, and all this time I've been singing 'all my heart' - I feel so silly. Not as silly as the people who think it's 'Alex the Seal' but up there.
Thompson Twins Kong and Chappy
Its a fb link so not sure if it will work
Kong said it was ok to post btw Stu.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=387057144685856&set=a.135743203…
Sjoe, Big game on Thurs. And justice prevailed... methinks GI said "you wanna treat me lil' mate Billy like that, now deal wif me @#1 mofos".
Classic to see 'em sent home, busted and bloody after some of their own medicine.
To be honest, on sheer effort, against the best, and after 6-0 I would have been almost cool with a NSW win. BUT, big BUT, QLD play a better brand of footy, a more cutloose expansive style of footy that is miles better spectacle than the chip/grubba>try that is oh so Ricky Stuart. Besides that, the dirty grubs can go get fucked, lol.
SOO is alive and well.
The whole world is jealous.
ATTN: SURFER Joe ...
this guy was onto something, may say ahead of his time. Gotta watch it to the end...
enjoy. :) > :-
well done, well played, back again next year to stick it up ya.
Hope that wannabe Taylor plays
Fuck I hope he plays
@Syd Yep... Winners are Grinners
High Praise for our Queensland Maroons with a Magnificent 7th Series in a Row
All except Pedro back next year to do it all again...
@macksville... Good Call? ...Coal Train was in Express Mode for Rabbits on W End...
he will rip Gallens head off and strike fear into Baby Blues Hearts...
he could sharpen up on his falling on the ball over the try line skills
bonehead
you and every other qlder know he is not origin
macksville... that's in Queensland !
Time to open up this can of worms? How big is a wave? I agree with this bloke: What do others think?
https://www.theinertia.com/surf/wave-sizes-and-puffed-chests/
I'd call the photo of MB at shippies about 12ft. Probably looked bigger on the take off though
Agree bout 12ft
quickly edited stubags
Hahahahaha....
Guys I provided this link in a previous post. I just got back from Macaronis where the crew there had a similar discussion re the size of the days waves. I stumbled across this article, open the link and read it if you feel like and share your thoughts.
https://www.theinertia.com/surf/wave-sizes-and-puffed-chests/
9 foot barrel diameter, 9 foot thick lip, 9 foot below sea level....bit of pythagorus...
Angle of the dangle is proportional to the heat in the meat.
Seriously though, I reckon 15 foot is reasonable.
Bit surprised Craig under-balled the size haha.
Ben there were 1/2 dozen 6 foot sets at North Avalon Monday morning but from my check from Palmy back to Manly it was the only spot. all the others were pulling 4-5 on low tide anyway.
BTW 12-15 I reckon and Laurie's is bigger..he's a tall fella.
Kidz of today are easily impressed by Mr superdonyoungy 's tall storey.
It's funny cause it's true.
‘Bout 10ft if you’re at margs
unless your the Margs morning surf report writer for swellnet then it would be 30ft. Is it another reporter or Anthony Pants back doing it again? Its been rainbows and unicorns and way over called lately. There needs to be a re calibration somewhere, nothing like a glossing the conditions up to 8/10 to make it more crowded than normal on whats really a 5/10 or a 6/10 at best
if it's 3 lairds, does that make it half a garry?
Well, the Facebook page for the The Eddie Aikau Big Wave Invitational just confused this whole wave-height-measuring-thing, posting a graphic showing "how to measure a wave Hawaiian style".
It explicitly states that wave height is measured from the back.
But when questioned about "Eddie's 80ft record wave" - and therefore, whether that meant the wave was actually 160ft - the response seems to be "soz, that one was measured from the front".
I can't believe this one slipped through without comment, Ben.
If we measure from the back, then surely Chopes would be off tap at "20ft". It looks like the back of a 20ft-face wave there would be about 6ft.
Surely this lends itself to the possibility that the UK Govt will mandate the measurement of wave heights in "hands".
"The hand is a non-SI unit of length equal to exactly 4 inches. It is normally used to measure the height of horses in some English-speaking countries, including Australia, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and the United States."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_units_of_measurement
So!
1 Hand = 10cm
3 Hands = 30cm
6 Hands = 2ft (Face Feet), or 1ft (Surfers Feet)
Head high = 3 feet (Surfers), 6ft feet (Face)... or 18 Hands.
I wonder how big it was before it started to break ?
Hi Tyler. No need for a response on the other Sydney forecast thread. As usual Ben is on the case! My surf this morning was 16 hands! I can tell the boys this arvo and enjoy my beers with no stress.
Measuring waves from the back has to be the stupidest thing in all of surfing. Right up there with goatboating.
We take the face height and half it because some people in the 1960s wanted to seem cool by under-calling wave size. The measuring the wave from the back thing was just some lame justification for this. We're stuck with it now just like how we measure surfboards in feet and inches.
How do you decide where the back of the wave ends? Theoretically doesn't it go back below sea level halfway to the next wave behind it? So maybe we can tell the Eddie tweeters its actually bigger if you measure from the back.
Yeah I've had this thought process, thinking back to old Yr12 wave diagrams.
I guess it is what it is, part of our culture etc.
Probably gets a bit silly when Seth calls 6ft+ Margs 4ft or whatever he said.
I use the scale but I also like just saying waist, shoulder, head high etc.
Hahahaha. I have a theory: The English made the imperial system to confuse the f@!k out of both enemies and their own peasants. Could you imagine those poor vikings re-calibrating their catapults to imperial scale once they arrived upon English soil? They went bezerk outta sheer frustration. Or, when some peasant had to negotiated fair-work agreements with his overlord in the Feudal System? The peasant thought he'd talked the overlord up from an acre to a perch.
The Hawaiian scale. I don’t think it was ever about the back of the wave which is a nonsense measure.
Nick Carroll thought it may have been from the old Hawaiian buoy measurements. The wave height at the old Kauai buoy, 11001, might say 10’ so people said the resulting waves at Sunset and Pipe were 10’.
Peter Cole, one of the original big wave surfers who moved from the U.S. mainland to the North Shore, once said when asked about the Hawaiian wave scale, “You know the guy that started this, underestimating waves, probably was this guy, Bob Simmons....I grew up with him, and he was sort of my guru. Myself, Buzzy (Trent) and a whole bunch of us followed him around. And he was always for the bigger waves, more than anything else. And you’d get real excited about some wave you got, and he’d always say it was only five feet.”
I remember reading an interview with the great Barry Kanaiaupuni.
What is this Hawaiian scale? he was asked.
Ha ha, it’s macho bullshit man, he replied.
There is probably quite a few factors involved.
20 feet
4 to 5 times overhead.
12 to 15 foot but geezus there ain't to measurement for that lip!!! That's a dump truck of Lairds... or one Gary in swellnet measures.
12 to 15 in my book (5 - 6 x overhead)
No doubt a lot of energy. It looks like a double up.
Only the Surfer Knows the Size
When like "..a hood ornament on a freight-train", theoretically time should slow down. Ample time to whip out the surveyor's staff and gives us all a scale. Then we could have avoided the escalation in the SN office.
I am guessing a 13ish ft face beast with a 6ish ft lip.
For some reason, this article popped up today and I thought it was a recent one (I didnt check the date and mind is meltdown with competing priorities). After I commented, I saw it was from 2012? Haha.
yea I found this article/commented after reading the one about the 97 foot wave.
I was looking for Iggys scale.
I’d say 12’ but if I was there and paddling out it would look more like 15’ -18’
i havent seen the pic, but based on the other comments, i would say 7ft Ulladullan if measured from the front, or 2 7/8ths feet from the back