And swells coming in through a narrow channel accelerate through the
constriction. Some won't have been large enough to break, while others will
be. I think that might be why there's a long period between rollers in the
picture sequence (of an obviously dangerous place, else why was someone
rushing to get the camera out BEFORE anything bad happened?). Also, ships
moving through the channel disrupt the swells, or create their own too.

Brian D



"Sal's Dad" wrote in message
...

After looking at many wave photos on this page, I think wave behavior
in that location is different than I am used to. This place seems to
have a very long period between waves with nearly flat water between
them, weird.


Was probably a 10-14' swell day with 13-15 second period. You have to
remember the waves hitting here have a couple of thousand miles of open
ocean to build in.


Keep in mind these are not traditional breakers, rolling into a beach, but
swells coming through a narrow channel - not very shallow water, but still
a bar with suddenly shallower depths.

For more info:
http://www.surfline.com/travel/surfm...fort_point.cfm

It appears the tide was coming in, so the boat was caught in one breaker -
rolled and dismasted - continued drifting under the bridge where the wash
of a second wave rolled it again, and then into the relatively calm water
of the bay.