FREAK WAVE GENERATION AND THEIR PROBABILITY

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Lopatoukhin, Leonid J. | Boukhanovsky, Alexander V.

Affiliations: Oceanology Department, State University, St. Petersburg, Russia | Institute for High Performance Computing, St. Petersburg, Russia

Abstract: The problem of extreme wave estimation is crucial at last 25–30 years due to active using of ocean resources. Mainly the attention paid to estimation of extreme waves in the fixed spatial point of the sea. But for ship navigations, transport operations, offshore supplying etc. estimates of the spatial occurrences of extreme waves are required. In these cases spatiotemporal variability of wave fields is of special interest. One of the most interesting extreme phenomena is freak (or rogue) waves. These one are anomaly steep and high waves. The probability of freak waves generation depends from a lot of internal (modulation, nonlinearities, etc.) and external (metocean) factors. Spatial dimensions of the sea region increase the probability of ship encounter with a freak wave. Classical statistical analysis of time series do not allows estimating the probabilities of freak waves occurrence and associated weather conditions. Main definitions of freak waves, reasons of appearance, possibility of generation in the sea and approach to estimation is presented.

Journal: International Shipbuilding Progress, vol. 51, no. 2-3, pp. 157-171, 2004