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EASTERN LINES
Red Bull's Project Swell brings surf forecasting down to earth
If you have any reason to visit the East Coast, you've gotta learn a few valuable lessons right off the bat. For instance, winter is the time to surf. You can grovel every day of July and not get the power you'll find in one frozen January session. Don't eat pizza, unless it's Jersey or New York. Gorge on steamed shrimp in North Carolina, and chowda in Maine, but only order 'za between Montauk and Cape May. Most of all, heed the word of Mark Willis. He knows his shit.
This week, ten of the most promising collegiate wave-forecasters on the East Coast journeyed to Red Bull's Project Swell, on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, a five-day surf forecasting seminar, conducted by Professor Willis, himself.
Of the fifty-plus students to compete in a forecasting contest, in association with the 2004 Red Bull Icebreak, the top ten were invited to Project Swell. They were flown to Virginia, and transported to their lecture hall, Red Bull's enormous beach house, in Avon, North Carolina; a fully operational surf forecasting facility and classroom.
In 2004, Red Bull and Surfline teamed up to bring the first Project Swell. Energized by Red Bull, 2005 reached for greater heights. Again, East Coast soothsayer, Mark Willis, who graduated from Florida State, and then obtained his Masters from the U of Hawaii, had the reigns. This year, Surfline West Coast forecaster, Adam Wright, brought his Pacific forecasting experience to the table, as well. While not engrossed in lectures or hands-on forecasting, the students hung with Red Bull team riders, Ian Parnell, of Virginia Beach, and the Outer Bank's own Billy Hume.
This year's participants included FSU Meteorology Majors Tommy Van Horn, and Kevin Maloney. Maloney, being from Point Pleasant, New Jersey, grew up on Lavallette beach breaks. Van Horn, a member of the FSU surf club, and a Woodlands, Texas native, actually left a rare Gulf of Mexico groundswell to take part.
Carrieanne Carstater had only seen the ocean once before, but surfing seemed the next natural step for this swimmer/snowboarder meteorology major from the California University of Pennsylvania. She grew up on Lake Eerie and has seen waves there. Can you see it now? "This is Carrianne with your Great Lakes forecast effective Thursday evening."
Fellow Cal U of Penn Meteorology Major, Guy Nestor, is actually the on-air weatherman for HSTV News 19, Uniontown, PA, when he's not chasing tornadoes. While he enjoyed the sunny Carolina beaches, he called back to the station.
"Put the sun graphic up for the morning, and the thunderstorm for the afternoon. It might be a severe one," he told the station folks back in Uniontown.
Tammie "Ocean" Priselac, has been surfing for 15 years, and now attends Cape Fear Community College. Her father was a meteorologist for the Air Force and NASA, and she figures she picked up the knack from him. She runs Carolina Surf Adventures, in Wrightsville Beach.
The University of Florida's Graham Hunley had a deep respect for Willis's teachings, despite the his school's heated rivalry with FSU. Hunley is working to get into photojournalism, and used the opportunity for insight into the world of surf photography.
Can't really pin down where Robert Heinsh is from: born in France, lived in Europe then New York, just graduated from Middlebury College in Vermont. When your father is a Dutch Diplomat, you can see and surf a lot of the world. He's become part of a healthy surf scene in Israel, and will return to New York, for med school.
New York's Dennis Murphy, of SUNY Stonybrook runs southshoresurf.com, an online resource for Long Island surfers. He's a Harbor Master at Fire Island, and knows how important ocean conditions are to boaters. Keen forecasting ain't a bad skill to have when you make your own schedule either.
Matt Porcelli, of Haddon Heights, New Jersey, is well entrenched in the Meteorology program at Penn State. The weather junkie had never surfed before, but qu
ickly became addicted to ocean forecasting, as well as ocean kayaking.
Even though Ivy Leaguer Daniel Curran graduated from Ha'vad, and is "wicked smat" he didn't realize how good the surf was in New England until recently. An educational trip is nothing new to this Environmental Engineer, who heads off to study the effects of carbon dioxide in the rain forests of Brazil, later this summer.
The students were all fixed on Willis and Wright, as they lectured from broad topics like the uses of oceanic meteorology, to specific hurricane swells of the past. Willis gave each of them an opportunity to study current and past models to make their own predictions.
The Outer Banks were plagued with a wave-killing Bermuda High for most of Project Swell, but the entire crew got on a popular sandbar for low-tide sessions. Parnell and Hume lit up the small surf to the amazement of the students, who traded waves with Willis and Wright. Red Bull's Josh Kendrick gave some impromptu surf lessons, and threw some buckets of his own. Nights were filled with some hearty college-style antics and even a trip up to Nag's Head's famous Pit for an Eastern Surf Magazine slide show.
Waves on the East Coast are fleeting. Luckily, we have guys like Willis to help us maximize our wave time. While he shares his experience, even more will be able to tap into his knowledge in the future and score.
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Jon Coen
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