Surely you’ve heard the story by now: a massive wave struck a cruise ship in the Antarctic smashing windows, killing one person, and injuring four other passengers at the end of November. Rogue waves are a recognized phenomenon, which Wikipedia describes as an “open-water phenomena, in which winds, currents, nonlinear phenomena such as solitons, and other circumstances cause a wave to briefly form that is far larger than the ‘average’ large wave…” Just a giant freak wave, in other words. I looked into one such “rogue wave” that struck Dayton Beach, Florida, in 1992, swamping hundreds of parked cars and injuring 75 people. Some people linked the event to a “falling object,” teasing the possibility that a meteorite might have been responsible. My story, The Daytona Beach Mystery Wave, which appeared in The Anomalist: 1, also considered other explanations for the rogue wave, including an undersea earthquake, an “oceanic burp,” a squall surge, and more. But no one seemed to agree on a cause. We can’t help but wonder if some larger-than-average small comets might be responsible for such “rogue waves.” (PH)
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