Yup, arms are officially dead. More surf on the way too!

We have had a steady run of perfect waves all day long on the north side of Rincon. The winds have kept a strong southerly flow which has kept conditions glassy just about the entire day for north facing beaches. Just about all the spots in Puerto Rico have been firing. Right now it looks like Saturday will take a break and be more of a surf lessons and kids day with smaller knee high conditions (unless some NW swell comes in early). Sunday the new NW pulse from Joaquin should start showing up with waves in the chest to head high range with bigger sets. With Hurricane Joaquin out in the ocean, a coldfront pulling off the states, and a new low in the open Atlantic generating gale force winds, we should remain chest high or bigger with south winds (or dead winds) for pretty much all of next week. Amazing! NE swell from the developing low mixed with NW Joaquin swell and some N fetch from the coldfront will mean multiple wave sets from different angles. There should be plenty of waves for everyone.

Hurricane Joaquin Strengthens – More surf on the way!

Hurricane Joaquin could strengthen to a category 3 right in our prime swell window over the weekend! But that’s not all – we have a coldfront pulling off the states and another tropical blob trying to form almost due north of PR. Basically we’re looking at multiple swells from multiple angles with south winds for the next 5 days and possibly beyond that. All of the north facing beaches in Puerto Rico should be on fire! The north side of the island should be barrel fest. We’ll start off with some of Joaquin’s NW swell tomorrow in the head high plus range that should last until the Coldfront pulls off and sends a NE swell from way out in the Atlantic for early next week.

Stay hydrated! The heat is going to be intense!

The temperatures are extremely hot right now in PR. Whenever the winds are dead or from the south we stay hot, humid, and stagnant. Drink plenty of water and don’t die of dehydration. Seriously, it’s going to be hot (it already has been).

Plenty of weather to watch for possible surf in Rincon.

We have a lot of weather going on but nothing that screams surf just yet. First of all, Tropical Depressions Nine and Ten are meaningless storms that will serve no purpose in life. Forget about them. However, that tropical blob hanging around off the coast of the Florida might be our best bet. If it can develop we’ll get decent surf as long as it can whip out a little more to the east. All of the storms suffer from westerly and southwesterly shear so don’t expect any windfield on his west side. Any swell we get will be from it’s possible movement east along with pressure gradient and a possible front or high pressure that may move the storm. If we get enough weather behind that blob we could see a week’s worth of fun surf. That’s the best case scenario. The worst case scenario (and most likely) is that the blob just gets swept away from a week front that only climbs lattitude and goes to Cananda and we get the skunk. Only time will tell. Any new swell to show up should get here around mid-week next week.

We’re about to get hit with more rain than waves.

As stated before Erika is a larger and more resilient storm than Danny. I don’t recommend thinking Erika will just be another Danny. There will be some weather tomorrow. I think the southern coasts and the east side of the island will see the worst of it tomorrow and then we’ll get the leftovers on Saturday. Tropical Storm Erika has been forecast to move a little higher north but she seems pretty stubborn and is a little lower latitude than most predicted. The front of the storm has absolutely no rain and weak winds. The back side of the storm is where the action is. Once that side of the storm makes its way to island we’ll see a lot of flooding so be careful. Most of the swell in the ocean right now is east swell and that probably won’t change. The storm was also forecast to be moving along quicker than it is currently moving. This means the whole process of Erika passing over us might be dragged out and for our side of the island the worst weather will be seen after she passes.

Long term outlook:

Tropical Storm Erika is probably going to degenerate into an open wave while passing over Dominican and Hispanola, but she might be enough intact to get going again near the Bahamas. Just north of the Bahamas is our sweet spot for NW tropical swell, but the storm needs a solid wind field in all quadrants. The shear is forecast to be low so if she can get high enough and power up fast enough we could see some NW swell into next week.

Tropical Storm Claudette forms – no major surf expected.

Tropical Storm Claudette is actually looking decent on satellite imagery, but she just doesn’t have the right trajectory or amount of strength to be a significant surf generator. If she was dipping down or intensifying or both then we could see a better chance at some tropical swell. Unfortunately, she’s doing the opposite of that. She’s moving away from us (as she has since formation) and is going to weaken. We still might see some background swell at some point over the next couple of days, but don’t expect too much.

Keep an eye on different parts of the island.

There are tropical waves passing the lower Atlantic and Caribbean. They have no chance whatsoever of forming down there, but they do have the ability to make fun waves at certain unique spots on the island. The southeast corner of PR has plenty of opportunities. If a wave is strong enough pressure-wise the north side of the island can see some fun surf as well. Now is the time to explore.

When does a higher latitude storm give Rincon waves?

When it’s very strong and has a solid high pressure build in behind it to amplify it’s backside fetch. We need a long fetch pointed at us to get surf no matter what force of nature is causing it. Also, if we do get a larger high latitude storm and it happens to make a wobble south or dip down we almost always get some good swell. Rapid intensification is also good for groundswell. When a storm sits kinda stationary in our swell wind and then rapidly intensifies it sets a bomb off in the ocean. Anything Category 3 and above in our swell window will generally give us good surf. These are the scenarios to watch for. I hope we see it happen this season.