Freaque wave happened in Caribbean Thursday night.

A freaque wave happened in the Caribbean Thursday (Nov. 26, 2015) night as reported in the Travel Mole. Here're the details:

Freak wave hits MSC cruise ship

Two cruise passengers suffered minor injuries when a freak wave struck the side of MSC Divina as she sailed in the Caribbean.

The wave hit the side of the ship at 23:40 local time on Thursday, damaging a small cabin porthole.

"One of two Mexican guests staying in the cabin sustained minor abrasions, while an Argentinean guest in another cabin slightly injured a finger when closing a balcony door," said the cruise line.

MSC Divina was sailing from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Nassau in the Bahamas when the incident happened.

"The safety and wellbeing of guests and crew are MSC Cruises' number one priority, and onboard technicians immediately sealed the damaged porthole," said the cruise line in a statement.

"As a further precaution, MSC Cruises has given alternative cabins to the guests from the affected cabin and those adjacent to it."

MSC Divina remained seaworthy and is continuing her itinerary, it added.

Friday, November 27, 2015

MSC is a Swiss based company. As usual that there's no details info available about the freaque wave other than it was hit at the side of the ship. Thank God for no serious mishaps.

Remembering the Fitz 40 years later

Every year around this time in early November, the Great Lakes area remembers the loss of SS Edmund Fitzgerald on November 10th, 1975. This morning the Detroit News published this article entitled "40 years later, Edmund Fitzgerald remains a mystery" written by Susan R. Pollack, Special to The Detroit News. So it's been 40 years, time flies! I still remember vividly the day after it's happening my colleague Tim Kessenich told me the news about it's happening. That was long before I got interested in rogue waves while we were deeply interested in Great Lakes waves. After that I did some hindcasting study on the possible wave conditions. I presented my study in the Great Lakes conference held in Ann Arbor the next year. As I remember that was the only time in my whole career, I made presentation to a room full of people even with people standing in the back. Hmm I was 40 years young then! The mystery Susan Pollack alluded about is basically what we are still not sure about what was really happened to the Fitz! For me personally as an interested bystander for 40 years I can only cite my favorite lines of Gordon Lightfoot's lyric:  

Does any one know where the love of God goes                                                                   when the waves turn the minutes to hours?   

                                                                                               

Was it a freaque wave?

This is a follow-up to the previous post regarding the capsizing of the whale-watching boat. This article in the Province, theprovince.com, by  Jeff Lee of PostMedia News, provided a eyewitness account as told to a rescuer, Frank, who recounted:

“They were saying they were looking at the seals and they saw this real big wave coming, bigger than the rest,” Frank said. “It brought them up and they fell over and just started tumbling, over and over. 

“The next thing they know the boat is full of water and they were all rushing out. The only thing they could see was the life raft, so they all swam for the life raft.”

Now here's a quite good description of wave happening: they can see the wave coming! Clearly there was no time for them to react and prepare when the wave hit them. I have two questions regarding this case: 1). They can see the wave coming, did the wave make any noise? and 2). Is this a freaque wave or just a regular large wave?