What price an offshore wind?

Yesterday the North Shore was hit by one of the largest swells in history and nowhere was ridable. Surf forecasters kept a close eye on the storm as it formed predicting a healthy XXL-size swell, however as it passed the dateline the storm jacked in intensity. Hurricane-force winds reached within 600 nautical miles of Hawaii and gale-force winds very close to the coast, and it was those winds that ruined what could've been a stellar swell event.

Regardless, it was still a swell for the record books. Renowned Hawaii swell forecaster, Pat Caldwell, put the swell in the 'giant' category and wrote: "Relative to historic giant episodes of the last 50 years, the occlusion point for the 2/22 episode was the closest [to the Hawaiian islands]."

The occlusion point is when the low pressure system stalls and the surface low lies beneath the upper low. And though it's not strictly correct, you and I can simply refer to it as the point when the low is at its strongest. Pat recalls that "the second closest occlusion point for giant surf locally happened 30 years ago in 1986, nearly to the day." That was on the 23/02/1986.

Unaware of obscure atmospheric book-keeping, Riley Edwards made his way down to Waimea and was overwhelmed with what he saw. Closeout sets regularly shut down the Bay and between the heads was a non-stop mix of confused energy.