List of rogue waves

The Draupner wave, a single giant wave measured on New Year's Day 1995, finally confirmed the existence of freak waves, which had previously been considered near-mythical.

This list of rogue waves compiles incidents of known and likely rogue waves – also known as freak waves, monster waves, killer waves, and extreme waves. These are relatively large and spontaneous ocean surface waves that occur in deep water, usually far out at sea, and are a threat even to large ships and ocean liners.

Background

Anecdotal evidence from mariners' testimonies and damages inflicted on ships have long suggested rogue waves occurred; however, their scientific measurement was only positively confirmed following measurements of the "Draupner wave", a rogue wave at the Draupner platform, in the North Sea on January 1, 1995. During this event, minor damage was inflicted on the platform, confirming that the reading was valid.

In modern oceanography, rogue waves are defined not as the biggest possible waves at sea, but instead as extreme sized waves for a given sea state.

It should be noted that many of these encounters are only reported in the media, and are not examples of open ocean rogue waves. Often a huge wave is loosely denoted as a rogue wave, when it is not. Claims in the media are also commonly sensationalized.

Freak waves have been cited in the media as a likely source of the sudden, inexplicable disappearance of many ocean-going vessels. However, although this is a credible explanation for unexplained losses, there is to date little clear evidence supporting this hypothesis nor any cases where the cause has been confirmed, and the claim is contradicted by information held by Lloyd's Register.[1][2] One of the very few cases in which evidence exists that may indicate a freak wave incident is the 1978 loss of the freighter München.

Known or suspected rogue wave incidents

Before 1950

Second half of the 20th century

The Master said it "came out of the darkness" and "looked like the White Cliffs of Dover." [21] Newspaper reports at the time described the cruise liner as attempting to "surf" the near-vertical wave in order not to be sunk.

21st century

References

  1. The story that "200 large ships lost to freak waves in the past two decades" was published in The Times (May 2006). The earliest reference seems to be in the press release by the European Space Agency (cited at the page bottom), and first quoted as "200 large ships of 600ft long or more in the past two decades sunk without trace". At the time the claim was made, there had only been 142 ships of that size lost at sea in the time frame, all with clear, known causes (source: Lloyd's Register - Fairplay). The main culprits were the Iranian and Iraqi air forces in the 1980s (See: Iran-Iraq war).
  2. oldweather.com Log entries of HMS Albemarle.
  3. naval-history.net Royal Navy Logbooks of the World War I Era: HMS ALBEMARLE - March 1915 to November 1916, 3rd BS, Grand Fleet, damaged in gale Nov 1915, North Russia (icebreaker)
  4. Jackson Papers, National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth, U.K. 255/4/31.
  5. Carol Fowl. Unplanned epics - Bligh's and Shackleton's small-boat voyages, website of the National Maritime Museum, first published in the magazine Sailing Today, Issue 75, July 2003.
  6. Excerpt: The Voyage of the James Caird by Ernest Shackleton
    • Smith, Craig B. Extreme Waves. Washington, D.C.: Joseph Henry Press, 2006. ISBN 0-309-10062-3, pp. 68-69
  7. "The Loss of the USS Memphis on 29 August 1916 – Was a Tsunami Responsible? Analysis of a Naval Disaster" by Dr. George Pararas-Carayannis
  8. heinonline.org 4 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 520 (1935-1936) Annotations of Opinions of the Attorney General of the United States
  9. 1 2 Chirnside, Mark (2004). The Olympic-Class Ships. Tempus Publishing Ltd. ISBN 0-7524-2868-3.
  10. 1 2 3 Rogue Giants at Sea, Broad, William J, New York Times, July 11, 2006
  11. Daniel Othfors. "The Great Ocean Liners: Bismarck/Majestic (II)".
  12. Chirnside, Mark (1957). Rescue Tug: The Story of the Flying Enterprise and the Salvage Tug Turmoil. Dutton. p. 187. ASIN B0007E5OVY.
  13. Rogue Waves, History Channel
  14. The Storm: Stolt Surf in the North Pacific, 1977, Petersen, Karsten, December 8, 2003; retrieved July 11, 2006.
  15. Freak Wave, BBC.co.uk programme summary for Horizon episode aired on 14 November 2002
  16. NOAA, Florida Weather History: Volusia County
  17. The Daytona Beach Wave of July 3-4, 1992: A Shallow Water Gravity Wave Forced by a Propagating Squall Line, January 1995
  18. Freak waves PDF (1.07 MiB), Beacon #185, Skuld, June 2005
  19. Holliday, NP, MJ Yelland, RW Pascal, VR Swail, PK Taylor, CR Griffiths, and EC Kent (2006). Were extreme waves in the Rockall Trough the largest ever recorded? Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 33, L05613
  20. National Marine Sanctuaries News, 19 November 2001. Accessed January 23, 2008
  21. Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary Hero . Accessed January 23, 2008 Archived March 22, 2005 at the Wayback Machine
  22. Guy Cochrane, USGS
  23. Hurricane Ivan prompts rogue wave rethink, The Register, 5 August 2005
  24. Freak wave pummels cruise ship, Sydney Morning Herald, April 18, 2005
  25. NTSB Marine Accident Brief: Heavy-weather damage to Bahamas-flag passenger vessel Norwegian Dawn, National Transportation Safety Board, April 16, 2005, reference NTSB/MAB-05/03
  26. Deadliest Catch Season 2, Episode 4 "Finish Line" Original airdate: April 28, 2006; approx time into episode: 0:40:00 - 0:42:00. Edited footage viewable online at Discovery.com
  27. Miami herald tribune, 14 June 2005, p.7
  28. Science out of the Box - host Andrea Seabrook, 15 December 2007
  29. Liu, Paul C. (2007). "A Chronology of Freaque Wave Encounters" (PDF). Geofizika 24 (1): 57–70. Retrieved October 8, 2012.
  30. "Beached: Amazing picture of the ferry that ran aground in Blackpool". Daily Mail (London). 5 February 2008.
  31. Cape Times. April 14, 2008. p. 1. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  32. The Australian. April 15, 2008. p. 9. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  33. "Tourists die when shark-diving boat capsizes". Mail & Guardian Online. April 13, 2008. Retrieved July 22, 2011.
  34. "Three shark-diving tourists die". IOL. April 14, 2008. Retrieved July 22, 2011.
  35. Leila Samodien & Murray Williams (April 14, 2008). "Freak wave caused shark-boat tragedy". IOL. Retrieved July 22, 2011.
  36. Brian Indrelunas (April 15, 2008). "Shark-diving industry mourns deaths". IOL. Retrieved July 22, 2011.
  37. "Giant Rogue Wave Slams Into Ship Off French Coast, Killing 2". Fox News. 2010-03-03.
  38. Monster waves threaten rescue helicopters PDF (35.7 KiB), U.S. Naval Institute, December 15, 2006
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Wednesday, February 03, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.