Hurricanes bring with them large, destructive waves. Hurricane waves at the coast are generated by hurricane winds. Some waves, called "swell," are created while the hurricane is offshore. These waves then travel the ocean to reach the coast. Other waves, called "wind seas," are created at the coast while the hurricane makes landfall. The primary difference between wind seas and swell is that more time passes between each consecutive swell wave. High surge allows large waves to move further inshore, bringing their destructive power to homes and other structures onshore. Large coastal waves have very high velocities that are much more destructive than the velocities associated with surge alone.
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Waves breaking at the shore during Hurricane Ike in 2008 (photo courtesy of P.M. Johnson).
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What Impacts the Size of Hurricane Waves?
Acknowledgements & Credits: Click here for literature cited in this section, "Hurricane Impacts." This material is based upon work supported by the Texas Department of Public Safety's Division of Emergency Management. Background photo courtesy of Mark Moran (Creative Commons license CC BY 2.0)
© 2019 Jennifer L. Irish & Steven M. Quiring. All rights reserved.
© 2019 Jennifer L. Irish & Steven M. Quiring. All rights reserved.