So it looks like there are another couple potential producers rolling off Africa! Oh wait, I guess I just jinxed it. My question though, is how long can we expect swell once these storms steer away from us? Does it all depend on how quickly they're booted towards Britain? Is the swell more productive on their way in or out of the EC (or does it not matter)?
when tropical storms are moving at a fast pace, they produce very little swell on the backside of the storm. When storms move slowly, the radiate swell more so in all directions. Bill is a fast moving swell, that is why we wont see swell hanging around for many days.
Ok so it does matter if they're heading towards or away from us. The speed thing definitely makes sense. I just figured when they're heading away from us, we still get swell but from another direction.
Don't overlook Fetch The physical size of the storm, as well as intensity, has a lot to do with it as well. In a perfect world (and it's not) you'd have a slow moving (even stationary), huge fetch, somewhat intense storm. But that only happens in the movies. As often as not, all the variables tend to work against each other in a sort of Yin/Yang process.
Your right it doesn't happen often, but Felix did do just that back in 95'. That was a long time ago and one hell of a tropical season.http://storm.surfline.com/map/atlantic/?1995s6&ll=43.96119063892024,-55.546875
I actually surfed the effects of Felix in OCNJ back then. It was my first storm swell and I always remember how much fun we had. I remember the conditions being great, but we would drift block by block as we were out there.
