How science explains monster waves

Rogue waves - enormous, spontaneous surface waves in the open ocean - were once the tall tales of sailors. They are waves that reach 2-3x taller than the largest average waves in the area, reaching heights of 75 – 100ft. With the help of a ESA satellite survey, the scientific community now accepts they happen frequently. What causes rogue waves?



Creator: Dianna Cowern
Writer: Sophia Chen
Editor: Jabril Ashe
Animator: Kyle Norby

Resources:
Drauper oil platform wave recreation: BBC
Oil Platform footage: James Eaton
Crashing Wave/Boat Animation: DAAC
Rogue Wave simulation: Lev Kaplan, Tulane University

More resources:
Music: APM and YouTube

[elliottmcollins]

This was a really sophisticated way of saying "well, it's complex"

[skurinski]

I think the trampoline experiment explains it good. Have a bunch of people jumping on it at different times and suddenly one person might shoot up

[EugeneKhutoryansky]

At least the scientific community eventually admitted that it was wrong about monster waves. There are some individuals who unfortunately will never admit that they were ever wrong about anything, no matter how much evidence exists to the contrary.

[dkb]

There are a ton of hosts on YouTube who are nothing more then a pretty face who can read off of a telepromptor. These people "act" and really have NO knowledge or passion for what they are talking about. This girl however. Really seems like she knows what she is talking about. She really does appear to have a love and understanding for physics. This girl is beautiful to begin with and if she really does love physics then it puts her on a whole higher level of beauty. I really think that I have a crush on physics girl lol.

[AndrewBennettScience]

What lovely timing you have; my students were learning about superposition in our physics class yesterday. Tomorrow's lesson plan will no include Physics Girl. Thanks for all the work you do! I've gotten several of my students hooked on your channel already.

[juanalejandrosanchez]

Passing by an old video. Sending best wishes and strenght for your recovery. Keep getting better

[CrankyPantss]

A good lesson, as always. You explain things in a very understandable way. Thanks for sharing this with us.

[soliton]

well the title promised way more explanation. i wasnt expecting the explaining to be just refering to the system as chaotic and leave it at that.
i want to see an example of how monster waves can form from a chaotic background. in detail!

[benjfactor]

This just came on my son’s “kids YouTube” and my near 6 yr old loves it.

[electronwave]

I now understand something thanks to Physics Girl -- why her arms move in a seemingly chaotic fashion during the video. Namely, interdependent behavior due to the double pendulum formed by the upper and lower arms hinged at the elbow ... 'because the motion of the bottom arm depends on the motion of the top arm, so it turns to chaos.'

[Jaredvic]

ROGUE WAVES! WE'VE DAMAGED THE SHIP KENWAY!

[KugleeKuglee]

This waves described with the Schrödinger equation.
When a wave suddenly start grow it is sucking energy from his neighbor waves. The big deal is when this monster grow his neighbours are lose height and behind the monster and neighbours creating a deep hole too... Very scary because this waves shaping a "vertical" walls compare with the normal waves...

[ericvilas]

Just last year they told us at my university that they were studying exactly this. Nonlinear chaotic effects to predict and explain rogue waves. (it's the University of Buenos Aires, in case you're wondering)
Pretty cool to see a you do a video on it less than a year later!

[gheckolock]

I really think you could review this topic now. You have so much more skill at illuminating 5 years on and there are recent developments that could do justice to a deep dive.

[PherotoneStudios]

The same concept applies to microphones being in and out of phase in the recording studio. This is a great explanation of constructive and destructive interference

[simonhopkins]

I hope Dianna is improving physically and mentally. Here's a rouge wave from the UK 👋🏻🖖🏻

[syfu]

When you make a superposition of several waves in-phase what you should observe is stronger the intensity but remain the period.
If that so, why you enlarge the width when 1:03.

[tomaswallyveira]

its the bottoms that make it so unpreditable, in a swimming pool with flat walls and bottom, its kinda easy to predict the behave of a wave... but the ocean bottom its anything but flat, so the superposition effect happens all the time at the bottom, and that make the waves pretty chaotic, more than the wind or the other factors you said. one wave in particular was analised by a few people, the Nazaré cannon, till they analised the bottom, wich has a canyon that froces waves to superposition, and kinda ressonate (not the correct term) agains the canyon walls, near the beach, the bottom deepth lowers and the canyon opens liberating all the energy accumulates on the canyon in a single spot, making huge waves in a particular spot, i know its not the same as rogue waves, but its still mainly the bottoms and the diferent swell directions crashing agains each other.

[rishabgaba]

Can you do a follow up on this with more info please?

[rg_]

your boat may not fare well, but it will say farewell.