I've been waiting patiently.
SURF:
I've you've read THE Surf Report recently, you saw that I predicted the El Nino 'winter' to start mid-October and that we usually get our first good storm around the same time. Well, it's October 15th and no good Aleutian storms are headed our way. No drought busting, landslide causing, roof leaking, wet ones. So we wait. In the meantime, surf has been great! So who am I to complain.
FORECAST:
If the forecast models hold true, we've got some action next week. First up is a storm in the Aleutians this weekend that will send us waves but alas no weather. Monday we get head high NW with overhead sets in SD. On Tuesday it's followed by some smaller chest high SW.
WEATHER:
Hopefully the humidity is over. Don't mind dry heat- just keep me out of the humidity. No offense Louisiana. This weekend we have a couple weak low pressure systems above us that are giving the mountains some showers but just low clouds and a breeze down here. Those will clear out by Tuesday. By the middle of the week and into next weekend, models are showing temps 10-15 degrees above normal for another heat wave. No humidity though- just temps in the mid to high 80's again. Just in time for a couple good swells. Nice timing Mother Nature.
BEST BET:
Pretty much the 2nd half of next week with great weather, Olaf, SW swell, NW swell, and warm water temps (as usual).
NEWS OF THE WEEK:
As you're well aware by now, water temps in the equatorial eastern Pacific (as well as California) have been way warmer than normal thanks to El Nino. We've also had an unusually warm 'blob' of warm water hanging off the coast of the Pacific Northwest this past year (due to various theories). Well for every reaction there is an opposite and equal reaction. Welcome to the Atlantic 'blob'; a colder than normal pool of water in the northwest Atlantic. Is the ocean out of whack? Sure looks like it. Here's CNN's side of the story:
"At first glance, it stands out like a sore thumb. That blob of blue and purple on the map. One of the only places on the globe that is abnormally cold in a year that will probably shatter records as the warmest globally.
It's being called the Atlantic blob. It's a large area in the North Atlantic that is seeing a pronounced cooling trend. The ocean surface is much cooler than normal and, in fact, record cold in some locations.
Scientists began to notice it developing over the last couple of years, and this cooling in the Atlantic is the complete opposite of the warming over in the Pacific. Much of the warming is attributed to El Nino, a natural process where warm water sloshes over the Central Pacific and extends to South America, but scientists are unable to completely explain what has been dubbed the Pacific blob. This pronounced warming over large areas of the entire Pacific Basin has fueled a well above average season for hurricanes and typhoons over the entire Pacific, and it could have contributed to the California drought, effects on the salmon industry and even tropical sharks seen in waters farther north than ever before.
The Atlantic cold blob is near Greenland. You may not expect to see such a pronounced cooling that far north. After all, we know that most of the documented climate change has affected the poles much more than equatorial regions. Greenland is home to an enormous sheet of ice.
In fact, if you combine the ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland, you will find 99% of the fresh water ice on Earth. Scientists believe it is the melting of ice in Greenland that is causing the cold anomaly.
A recent study by top climatologists shows that massive ice loss is occurring over Greenland and is disturbing the normal Atlantic Ocean circulation, called the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, or AMOC. You may be familiar with part of this circulation, the Gulf Stream, which brings warm, tropical surface water northward along the East Coast of the United States and funnels toward the poles. The other main current in the AMOC is a return flow of deep, cold water that runs southward from the poles toward the tropics. This current has dramatic effects on our weather globally. The heat and cold driven by the current transfer to the atmosphere and help drive our weather patterns.
Normally, cold salt water in the North Atlantic sinks, because it is denser, and it is replaced by warm water moving in from the south. A similar process drives the high and low pressure systems and jet stream that drive our weather. In this case, the study suggests that the massive amounts of fresh water melting into the ocean from Greenland can prevent the sinking of the dense, cold, salty water and alter the AMOC circulation.
Believe it or not, this was the very scenario in the popular movie "The Day After Tomorrow." In the movie, the global climate changes in a matter of days, causing tornadoes in Los Angeles, deadly hail in Tokyo and a massive blizzard in New York City.
Fortunately "The Day After Tomorrow" scenario is Hollywood fiction at its best, and not based on sound science. That said, there is cause for concern.
While there is no scientific consensus that the Pacific and Atlantic blobs are related to climate change, there is evidence that they are. The effects of that relationship -- while not like those portrayed in the movie -- could still be severe. The loss of the normal ocean circulation could cause drastic shifts in weather patterns, and continued loss of ice in Greenland will lead to the continued rise in sea level, threatening coastal cities around the globe."
PIC OF THE WEEK:
Absolutely L-O-V-E love this pic (courtesy of Surfer Magazine might I add). I'm a sucker for weird waves. Odd little wedges bouncing off a cliff, low tide double ups on a shallow reef, gurgling sand sucking rip tide waves, the stranger the better. This one may be the oddest of them all. You know the little sand bars in front of our lagoons here in San Diego county? Doesn't matter if it's Tijuana Sloughs, Torrey Pines, or Ponto; all day long the tide fills in the lagoons and when it drains during low tide, the sand bars form. What if you had a lagoon the size of let's say San Francisco Bay? That's a lot of water making a sandbar the size of the Sahara. The end result is a sandbar called the Potato Patch with waves breaking a mile out to see. A sight like no other. Make sure to take a break today and read Doc Renneker's story of his attempt to ride one of the beasts. Even the paddle out was an adventure...
Keep Surfing,
Michael W. Glenn
Local Legend
Mike Glenn Costumes Flying Off The Shelves
Bodysurfed Potato Patch. At Night.
