And that's why when waves come ashore they get bigger and bigger until they crash near the shoreline. This is basic stuff.Mikey wrote:That's a pretty cool map. It looks like there are some areas, not that far south of Mobile Bay, that are over 1000 fathoms (6,000 feet). Some areas pretty close to Pensacola that are 150 to 500 fathoms, which is 3,000 feet. I'm actually surprised how deep the Gulf is. According to Wikipedia the average depth in the Gulf is over 5,000 feet. Maybe that's one reason that hurricanes build up so quickly there.
When I asked "and you know this...how" what I meant was what do you actually know about how the waves build up. I know that when the depth gets shallow close to shore they get dampened pretty quickly but I've heard that in deep areas, and with 140 (or even 135) mph winds, the giant waves can kick up pretty quickly.
Muskie lakes up north that get 60-80 feet deep can get a little rough, but in the same conditions Lake Winnebago is much more dangerous (137,700 acres, average depth 15.5 feet, max depth 21 feet).