Theodore Roosevelt Thursday Surf & Culture Report
Lost Boys & Co...
Two shots of a couple of long time Topaz/Sapphire locals. Number One is Mark the Poolman. A mainstay at Sapphire he rides it when it's big and crazy everywhere else. That itself is interesting, since he likes it big and crazy, no matter where it is. He rides a long, thin zebra striped board and always seems to be just in the right place for the biggest, choicest waves. Number two is Sandy Malpee, also a fixture at Sapphire. You might notice that she looks a bit stiff in her foul weather gear. That's because she's wearing a back-brace, the result of a recent surgery to repair a couple of bothersome discs. She's about half way through her convalescence, so we hope to see her back in the water sometime in March.
Under cloudy, rainy skies (with rain heavy at times,) we have 3 miles visibility. Winds are howling offshore by 25.5kts and the sea surface is blown smooth, with a bit of east tack. The air temp is 51.3° and the water is holding inn the upper 50's at 58.8°. Low tide starts out the morning at 6:54am +2.0' and high tide follows at 12:10pm +3.3'. The buoy is reading an 8.2' swell out of the west at 262°. We're calling it 6' to 8' with some rogue waves coming through occasionally. We hit Sapphire a bit later this morning and the east winds were still keeping it smooth and shapely. Patience seems to be the order of the day and we were rewarded quite nicely! Looks like we should continue to have waves over the next week at least.
Mail Bag:
From: Paver
Ignoring DB's raining admonition?
(Simply, yes. We looked at the runoff and it appeared to be significantly less turbid than when it initially started raining. Not that the bad stuff is actually going to look bad, but using our shaky science we chose to carry on. Oh, yeah, the waves were good... Ed.)
Because you deserve to know... We got this from Robert Stassi:
Subject: El Nino
This was sent by Curt Storlazzi at the USGS:
Currently, the strong El Nino is reaching its peak in the Eastern
Pacific, and now finally appears to be exerting an influence on our
weather. The strong jet has been apparent for quite some time out over
the open water, but the persistent block had prevented it from reaching
the coast.
Now that the block has dissolved completely, a 200+ kt jet is barreling
towards us. Multiple large and powerful storm systems are expected to
slam into CA from the west and northwest over the coming two weeks, all
riding this extremely powerful jet stream directly into the state. The
jet will itself provide tremendous dynamic lift, in addition to
directing numerous disturbances right at the state and supplying them
with an ample oceanic moisture source. The jet will be at quite a low
latitude over much of the Pacific, so these storms will be quite cold,
at least initially. Very heavy rainfall and strong to potentially very
strong winds will impact the lower elevations beginning late Sunday and
continuing through at least the following Sunday. This will be the case
for the entire state, from (and south of) the Mexican border all the way
up to Oregon.
Above 3000-4000 feet, precipitation will be all snow, and since
temperatures will be unusually cold for a precipitation event of this
magnitude, a truly prodigious amount of snowfall is likely to occur in
the mountains, possibly measured in the tens of feet in the Sierra after
it's all said and done. But there's a big and rather threatening caveat
to that (discussed below).Individual storm events are going to be hard
to time for at least few more days, since this jet is just about as
powerful as they come (on this planet, anyway). Between this Sunday and
the following Sunday, I expect categorical statewide rainfall totals in
excess of 3-4 inches. That is likely to be a huge underestimate for most
areas. Much of NorCal is likely to see 5-10 inches in the lowlands, with
10-20 inches in orographically-favored areas. Most of SoCal will see 3-6
inches at lower elevations, with perhaps triple that amount in favored
areas.
This is where things get even more interesting, though. The models are
virtually unanimous in "reloading" the powerful jet stream and forming
an additional persistent kink 2000-3000 miles to our southwest after
next Sunday. This is a truly ominous pattern, because it implies the
potential for a strong Pineapple-type connection to develop. Indeed, the
12z GFS now shows copious warm rains falling between days 12 and 16
across the entire state. Normally, such as scenario out beyond day seven
would be dubious at best.
Since the models are in such truly remarkable agreement, however, and
because of the extremely high potential impact of such an event, it's
worth mentioning now. Since there will be a massive volume of
freshly-fallen snow (even at relatively low elevations between 3000-5000
feet), even a moderately warm storm event would cause very serious
flooding. This situation will have to monitored closely.
Even if the tropical connection does not develop, expected rains in the
coming 7-10 days will likely be sufficient to cause flooding in and of
themselves (even in spite of dry antecedent conditions).
In addition to very heavy precipitation, powerful winds may result from
very steep pressure gradients associated with the large and deep low
pressure centers expected to begin approaching the coast by early next
week. Though it's not clear at the moment just how powerful these winds
may be, there is certainly the potential for a widespread damaging wind
event at some point, and the high Sierra peaks are likely to see gusts
in the 100-200 mph range (since the 200kt jet at 200-300 mb will
essentially run directly into the mountains at some point). The details
of this will have to be hashed out as the event(s) draw closer.
In short, the next 2-3 weeks (at least) are likely to be more active
across California than any other 2-3 week period in recent memory. The
potential exists for a dangerous flood scenario to arise at some point
during this interval, especially with the possibility of a heavy
rain-on-snow event during late week 2. In some parts of Southern
California, a whole season's worth of rain could fall over the course of
5-10 days. This is likely to be a rather memorable event. Stay tuned.
(Yeah we are!... Ed.)
"When the surf breaks, we'll fix it..."
The Professor!!
.
Two shots of a couple of long time Topaz/Sapphire locals. Number One is Mark the Poolman. A mainstay at Sapphire he rides it when it's big and crazy everywhere else. That itself is interesting, since he likes it big and crazy, no matter where it is. He rides a long, thin zebra striped board and always seems to be just in the right place for the biggest, choicest waves. Number two is Sandy Malpee, also a fixture at Sapphire. You might notice that she looks a bit stiff in her foul weather gear. That's because she's wearing a back-brace, the result of a recent surgery to repair a couple of bothersome discs. She's about half way through her convalescence, so we hope to see her back in the water sometime in March.
Under cloudy, rainy skies (with rain heavy at times,) we have 3 miles visibility. Winds are howling offshore by 25.5kts and the sea surface is blown smooth, with a bit of east tack. The air temp is 51.3° and the water is holding inn the upper 50's at 58.8°. Low tide starts out the morning at 6:54am +2.0' and high tide follows at 12:10pm +3.3'. The buoy is reading an 8.2' swell out of the west at 262°. We're calling it 6' to 8' with some rogue waves coming through occasionally. We hit Sapphire a bit later this morning and the east winds were still keeping it smooth and shapely. Patience seems to be the order of the day and we were rewarded quite nicely! Looks like we should continue to have waves over the next week at least.
Mail Bag:
From: Paver
Ignoring DB's raining admonition?
(Simply, yes. We looked at the runoff and it appeared to be significantly less turbid than when it initially started raining. Not that the bad stuff is actually going to look bad, but using our shaky science we chose to carry on. Oh, yeah, the waves were good... Ed.)
Because you deserve to know... We got this from Robert Stassi:
Subject: El Nino
This was sent by Curt Storlazzi at the USGS:
Currently, the strong El Nino is reaching its peak in the Eastern
Pacific, and now finally appears to be exerting an influence on our
weather. The strong jet has been apparent for quite some time out over
the open water, but the persistent block had prevented it from reaching
the coast.
Now that the block has dissolved completely, a 200+ kt jet is barreling
towards us. Multiple large and powerful storm systems are expected to
slam into CA from the west and northwest over the coming two weeks, all
riding this extremely powerful jet stream directly into the state. The
jet will itself provide tremendous dynamic lift, in addition to
directing numerous disturbances right at the state and supplying them
with an ample oceanic moisture source. The jet will be at quite a low
latitude over much of the Pacific, so these storms will be quite cold,
at least initially. Very heavy rainfall and strong to potentially very
strong winds will impact the lower elevations beginning late Sunday and
continuing through at least the following Sunday. This will be the case
for the entire state, from (and south of) the Mexican border all the way
up to Oregon.
Above 3000-4000 feet, precipitation will be all snow, and since
temperatures will be unusually cold for a precipitation event of this
magnitude, a truly prodigious amount of snowfall is likely to occur in
the mountains, possibly measured in the tens of feet in the Sierra after
it's all said and done. But there's a big and rather threatening caveat
to that (discussed below).Individual storm events are going to be hard
to time for at least few more days, since this jet is just about as
powerful as they come (on this planet, anyway). Between this Sunday and
the following Sunday, I expect categorical statewide rainfall totals in
excess of 3-4 inches. That is likely to be a huge underestimate for most
areas. Much of NorCal is likely to see 5-10 inches in the lowlands, with
10-20 inches in orographically-favored areas. Most of SoCal will see 3-6
inches at lower elevations, with perhaps triple that amount in favored
areas.
This is where things get even more interesting, though. The models are
virtually unanimous in "reloading" the powerful jet stream and forming
an additional persistent kink 2000-3000 miles to our southwest after
next Sunday. This is a truly ominous pattern, because it implies the
potential for a strong Pineapple-type connection to develop. Indeed, the
12z GFS now shows copious warm rains falling between days 12 and 16
across the entire state. Normally, such as scenario out beyond day seven
would be dubious at best.
Since the models are in such truly remarkable agreement, however, and
because of the extremely high potential impact of such an event, it's
worth mentioning now. Since there will be a massive volume of
freshly-fallen snow (even at relatively low elevations between 3000-5000
feet), even a moderately warm storm event would cause very serious
flooding. This situation will have to monitored closely.
Even if the tropical connection does not develop, expected rains in the
coming 7-10 days will likely be sufficient to cause flooding in and of
themselves (even in spite of dry antecedent conditions).
In addition to very heavy precipitation, powerful winds may result from
very steep pressure gradients associated with the large and deep low
pressure centers expected to begin approaching the coast by early next
week. Though it's not clear at the moment just how powerful these winds
may be, there is certainly the potential for a widespread damaging wind
event at some point, and the high Sierra peaks are likely to see gusts
in the 100-200 mph range (since the 200kt jet at 200-300 mb will
essentially run directly into the mountains at some point). The details
of this will have to be hashed out as the event(s) draw closer.
In short, the next 2-3 weeks (at least) are likely to be more active
across California than any other 2-3 week period in recent memory. The
potential exists for a dangerous flood scenario to arise at some point
during this interval, especially with the possibility of a heavy
rain-on-snow event during late week 2. In some parts of Southern
California, a whole season's worth of rain could fall over the course of
5-10 days. This is likely to be a rather memorable event. Stay tuned.
(Yeah we are!... Ed.)
"When the surf breaks, we'll fix it..."
The Professor!!
.
