samedi 21 janvier 2017

January 21st, 2017

Some of the biggest waves in the world can be found in Nazaré, Portugal. Just off the coast is the Nazaré underwater canyon - roughly 5000 feet deep - which amplifies the size of waves shortly before they reach the shore. These massive waves have unsurprisingly attracted surfers, and it was here that the record for 'highest wave surfed' was set in 2013 at 30 meters (~100 feet). Videos of surfers getting up to such heights are quite something to behold. Out in the ocean, where the seabed is much further from the surface, it was traditionally though that giant waves couldn't occur. Besides the stories of sailors, evidence for their existence came only in 1995, when a wave of 25.6 meters (84 feet) was measured in the North Sea. It is now know that these giant ocean waves (called rogue waves) are not impossibly rare, with an estimated 10 in the Earth's oceans at any point. How they come to be created out in deep oceans is still an open question.

-E

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