The giant wave in the Pacific was the most extreme ‘rogue wave’ ever seen: ScienceAlert

In November 2020, a strange wave of blue appeared, lifting a lone buoy off the coast of British Columbia 17.6 meters (58 feet) high.

The four-story wall of water was finally confirmed in February 2022 as the most extreme rogue wave ever recorded at that time.

It is believed that such an extraordinary event occurs only once every 1,300 years. Unless the float had been taken on a voyage, we might never have known it had happened.

For centuries, the waves have been rogue It is considered nothing but marine folklore. The legend did not become reality until 1995. On the first day of the new year, a wave about 26 meters (85 feet) high suddenly hit an oil exploration platform about 160 kilometers (100 mi) off the coast of Norway.

At that time, the so-called Drobner wave challenged all previous models that scientists had put together.

Since then dozens More rogue waves were recorded (Some are even in lakes), and although the island that emerged near Ucluelet, Vancouver Island was not the longest, its relative size compared to the surrounding waves was unprecedented.

Scientists define a rogue wave as any wave whose height is more than twice the height of the surrounding waves. For example, Drubner’s wave height was 25.6 metres, while its neighbors’ wave height was only 12 metres.

By comparison, the Ucluelet wave was approximately three times the size of its counterparts.

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“In relative terms, the Ucluelet wave is probably the most extreme rogue wave ever recorded.” to explain Physicist Johannes Gemerich from the University of Victoria in 2022.

“Only a few rogue waves have been directly observed in high seas countries, and nothing of this magnitude has been observed.”

Today, researchers are still trying to figure out how rogue waves form so we can better predict when they will appear. This includes measuring rogue waves in real time as well as running models the way the wind drives them.

The buoy that caught the Ucluelet wave was placed offshore along with dozens of others by a research institute called MarineLabs in an effort to learn more about the dangers found in the deep.

Even when freak waves occur offshore, they can still destroy offshore operations, wind farms or oil platforms. If they are large enough, they can endanger the lives of beachgoers.

Fortunately, neither Ucluelet nor Drubner caused any serious damage or took any lives, but other rogue waves did.

For example, some ships that were lost in the 1970s He is now believed to have drowned By sudden waves looming on the horizon. The remaining floating debris looks like the work of a huge white hat.

Unfortunately 2020 Stady Projected wave heights in the North Pacific will increase with climate change, suggesting that the Ucluelet wave may not hold its record as long as our current projections indicate.

“We aim to improve safety and decision-making for marine operations and coastal communities through large-scale measurement of the world’s coastlines.” He said MarineLabs CEO Scott Beatty.

“Capturing this once-in-a-thousand-year wave, right in our own backyard, is an exciting indicator of the power of coastal intelligence to transform marine safety.”

The study was published in Scientific reports.

A previous version of this article was published in February 2022.