One Week Post Storm- Looking Ahead

I wasn't happy about losing my storm post, but I figure the best thing to do right now is to look ahead until the mess is over.  When everything settles back to normal, or when the realization comes that there is not really any such thing as normal, then it will be time to tell the tale of the most terrible storm to affect our coastline.  It's amazing how much the weather can impact, it is the ultimate common denominator between everyone.  There aren't many other things that have such a profound effect on a large scale.

Sometimes you don't appreciate what it's like to live with something until you live without it, and that is the way I feel right now about being away from the barrier island.  Though I am not there, what I gather is that the clean up and repair effort is aggressive.  Though I have heard of loss, I have also heard good news.  Though this may not be a great situation, there are probably many people who have been on Long Beach Island in the last few years who have never heard of the 1962 Great Atlantic Storm.  That's because the shore came back after 1962- so well that the storm was eventually nothing but memories and stories.


Great progress has been made at the new inlet in Mantoloking in the last week. From NJ.com 

Another inlet filled and a temporary road.  From NJ.com

But there is something nasty about this series of events.  The northeast winds may blow hard on Wednesday.  After being drastically in error about what the last storm would do, I don't want to predict anything for this one.  It's even more difficult because there are no dunes.  Other than a wider sandbar that will hopefully break the waves, there is nothing to stop the ocean from coming in at some areas.  When I left everything was so flat, so vulnerable, so we'll see.

The 24hr and 48hr forecast would be okay any other time, but not now.  This looks to be a tight and nasty little northeaster.

Bad timing for this one.  Fortunately the moon tide is less this week and the wind looks like it will go hard NW behind the storm.  Also the wind field will be a lot smaller.  The size of the wind field was what made the last storm so spectacular.

Fortunately the swell looks brief.

There was a nasty series of nasty northeasters from December 1913 to January 1914.  From what I read the second one gave Sea Bright back to the sea for a while.  It will be what it will be, I guess, in regards to the Wednesday blow.  The Jersey shore has been a target for stormier weather this fall, beginning with the strongest south wind in years during September.  When you get in a trend, you tend to stay in it, which I don't like when the trend is not cool.  Have to keep moving.

The Great Storm of 2012

I inadvertently lost the storm post.  I will work on getting the information back over the next several days.  Never been through a weather event like this before.  Everything is off.

If you need or want to see photographs from Mantoloking to Camp Osborn, please e-mail.

The cloak of secrecy and lack of knowledge will lift once residents are allowed to return to the island.  Photographs do not replace the experience of seeing what this storm has done.  I've heard the clean up has been going well, but it may be shocking.  It is not the same.

Everything is Going on!

"It was some of the best fall fishing I've seen in a long time."  "Oh it was beautiful, the bunker were that nice size, hand size, and the one day the bass were 20-30 pounds."  "Everybody that went did good, this one did good, that one did good."  "It was the best big bluefish bite in years.  Giant blues from 10-19 pounds, we weighed one."  "I had 10 big bluefish in a row without moving once.  They were just in, no birds, they were just there.  Three hours of big blues!"

It was the unemployed fisherman's dream this week.  Big bass, regular bass, and giant blues crashed beaches during the workday on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday as was reported to me.  Oh it was great they said.  Steve called me in the middle of the day Friday with a report of bluefish bite that was epic.  He didn't even have to talk about the fishing- I could tell it was good just by the tone of his voice.  He rattled off the stats- fish after fish, hours long, poppers.  Ok this is great, I thought.  Work will be over in a few hours- and I'll find some fish.  As it turned out- I found no fish.  I got on the beach and it had that 'it's over' look.  Buggies clustered, but everyone chatting instead of fishing.  I threw blind anyway for two hours and had one hit.

Everyone got off work but the fish took a break.  Only one rod was down in a line of 20 guys on Saturday.

Not to be deterred, I enjoyed the stories.  The way I view it is that I've caught fish before, I will catch them again, and I like to be aware.  So to hear about a great bite that I could not make is fine with me, I'm just glad it happened.  I waited out the tide figuring it would turn on around the same time.  Several boats started to coalesce- a tell tale sign.  Here we go.  One rod was bent.  I heaved my popper into the increasing east winds, but that didn't work.  The guy next to me hooked up on metal.  I have no shame in copying what is working.  I switched to metal and moved to the next spot.  Bang!  Hooked up on one crank.  Ahhhh what a great feeling!  But there would be no more.  The fish scattered.  A few more were picked up here and there, but that was pretty much it.

I tell you it will not be the unemployed fisherman's dream next week . . .

Here comes Sandy!

Just when the fishing gets exciting, an exciting storm shows up.  Hurricane Sandy.  I don't think it will be a hurricane in the traditional sense, meaning a really intense storm that blows through in half a day, what this will be is more like a classic nor'easter.  Several days of hard onshore winds and high tides.  If the storm follows the center of the forecast track, New Jersey will have the longest period of strong onshore winds.  What this means for the fishing is that there will not be any Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, most likely part or all of Thursday, and maybe even into Friday.

 

For those who can bring to life the difference between a hurricane and a nor'easter, it might be more accurate to think of the pending storm as more like a nor'easter.  That doesn't mean it's no big deal.  There probably won't be any 2x4s slicing through telephone poles, but the beach is still going to get banged up.

 

Hurricane Sandy is or will likely be a hybrid storm- a storm who's gender lies in the gray area between tropical cyclone and extratropical cyclone.  Those kinds of things exist, you know, and they can sometimes take on the best (or worst) qualities of the traditional storms.  Instead of intense winds concentrated solely around a storm center (like a tropical cyclone) what there will be are more moderate winds diffused over a more widespread area (like an extratropical cyclone).  'Moderate winds' in this case is referring to gale force or storm force winds- and those kinds of winds over a widespread area can create a nasty sea.  The sea level is already higher since the wind has been out of the east for the past few days, and there is the full moon, so the water will be up.

 

The data I am aware of right now (which is only 'real world' since I have been fishing all day and not on the computer) combined with intuition generates this forecast:

 

Wind

 

It will be windy.  It will not be exceptionally windy.  The winds along the beaches will reach gale force.  Gusts my get to 60mph.  A 74mph wind may occur, but that will probably not be the norm.  Windy for sure, but mostly below the hurricane threshold.  The problem is the strong onshore winds are going to last for at least two days, piling up the water.

 

The winds will be high enough to take down trees.  Last year a lot of trees came down during Irene, but there was also record rain two weeks prior and during the storm which made that type of thing more likely.  The ground moisture is mostly normal, and rainfall will probably not be as high with this event.  Even so, the winds will be high enough to snap branches and possibly take a tree down.

 

Rain

 

Rainfall is forecast to be heavy relative to average storms, but not as heavy as Irene last year to use that example again.  It's also good that rainfall has been fairly close to average for the past few weeks.  The rain will have the biggest impact inland, and places that usually flood will flood, but it probably won't be as exceptional as last year.

 

The Beach

 

If your buggy conks out on the sand tomorrow, it's going to be a new reef.  The forecast is for NE winds 20-30mph on Sunday, increasing all the way through Monday night.  Monday evening will be the worst of it as the peak of the storm looks like it will coincide with the full moon high tide.  The beach might get pretty wrecked.  What will happen is all the sand piled up on the beach will get taken out, the beach will be flattened, and the bar will be way out there again.  The dunes will be hit for the first time since Irene last year, but may end up looking more like after the 2009 Nor Ida nor'easter.  The beach will probably look a lot different on Friday, and the new complaint may be about the uni-bar waaay out there.

 

Coastal Flooding

 

Bay flooding- especially in Raritan Bay and the Delaware Bay- may be a major issue.  I would picture that everywhere that normally floods on the island from the bay will flood, and then some.  With the forecast as it is, I have no doubt the water will be coming up the driveway and that Route 35 S will be impassible for several days.

 

If you could hear the extrasensory world of invisible communication, you'd probably be going nuts from everyone talking and sending text messages about Sandy.  It's enough out here in the sensory world, but it's fine for me because I love a good storm.  For the next three days, it will be just me and my rain jacket and old waders and mother nature.  I can't wait to trudge up to the beach for the high tides with the wind and rain in my face.  The waves crashing into the dunes and its so loud you hear nothing.  I've had people tell me that is a strange thing to do, to go up there in that.  And I always think if I have to explain it to you, you'll never understand.

 

So it's time to experience the weather.  The computer will be off.  The whole power system may even be off.  It may just be my family and I, the dog, a candle, and a dark night with a howling wind.  Fine with me.

 

 

 

 

 

New England Trip

Steve's pictures can do the speaking . . .

On Saturday morning I reached the new level.  It came with four hours of light fog, light winds, 4-6ft reeling peaks- and miraculously only two other guys out.  The rides and the paddle out were so long I almost never stopped moving.  I had every wave I wanted with no competition.  But after a couple hours, I just sat there for a moment.  The sky was gray with low clouds and fog, but the wind was light and the water was glassy.  The ocean was cool, though was refreshing. 

I let a set go by and watched from behind as the waves peeled over the reef with no one on them.  I looked back at our house across the road.  I scanned all the way west, out to sea, and over to the east.  I saw no one.  I was all alone in a sea of perfect waves.  And then I got it.  The chills came over me a little as I watched the next set gathering on the reef, just for me.  I didn't move as the waves felt the bottom and formed up into a perfect peak right in front of me.  I looked to my right and left and there was no one there.  I turned around and began the paddle into another perfect six foot wave.  What a trip.