On a grey morning off the coast of Nazaré, Portugal, the ocean doesn’t look angry at first. It looks busy. Swells roll in from the horizon like dark, moving hills, each one a little taller than the last. Surfers bob like tiny dots on the surface, watching, waiting, while on the cliff above, tourists press their phones to the wind and gasp in unison.
Then it rises.
A wall of water builds out of nothing, 35 metres high, blotting out the sky behind the surfer who has decided, somehow, that this is a good idea. Far away, in a coastal village facing a different ocean, parents check tide charts on their phones, eyes lingering on the word “swell” a second too long. One side calls it a natural wonder. The other calls it a warning.
Meteorologists warn early February could mark the beginning of an Arctic destabilization event
Both are right.
When a “scientific marvel” looks like the end of the world
Stand next to an oceanographer at the edge of a stormy pier and you’ll hear a different language. They talk about wave periods, fetch lengths, and rogue wave probabilities. Their eyes light up when the buoys record a 35 metre monster out at sea. To them, it’s like nature dropping a once-in-a-generation experiment right into their lap.
To the woman whose house sits six metres above sea level, that same data point is not a curiosity. It’s a countdown.
These colossal waves have become media darlings. Viral drone footage, slow-motion wipeouts, record-breaking rides. Scientists call them “extreme events”, “valuable for modelling” and “critical to understanding future climate scenarios”. Coastal communities hear another message entirely: “We’re studying it” can sound an awful lot like “You’re on your own”. When your front yard is turning into a saltwater pond, academic excitement feels strangely out of place.
In western Ireland, residents of tiny villages like Doonbeg and Lahinch remember the winter of 2013–2014. Storm after storm pounded the coast. Waves crashed clear over two-storey sea walls, flinging boulders the size of cars onto roads and into gardens. One night, a single freak wave smashed through a beachfront café window and threw tables across the room like toys.
Local news called it “the worst winter in decades”. Research papers later called it a “remarkable natural laboratory”. Those phrases exist in the same world but not in the same reality. The café owner ended up serving tea from a food truck for months while waiting on insurance. For her, the lab wasn’t a place you visit. It was her living room.
Scientists aren’t villains in this story. They’re often the first to sound the alarm that coastlines are changing fast. Still, the way the story gets told matters. Call a 35 metre wave “beautifully energetic” in a TV interview and you might trigger a wave of anger you didn’t see coming. People already living with eroding dunes and flooded basements hear a kind of emotional mismatch.
This is where trust starts to fray. When the same images that terrify you are framed as spectacular content for social feeds, something inside quietly asks: whose ocean is this, really?
Between wonder and warning: how to live with a rising sea
If you live near the shore, you don’t need a PhD to read the water. You notice the way storms feel different than they did twenty years ago. The wind has a harsher edge, the waves climb a little higher up the promenade. One concrete, practical move is to build your own “wave diary” long before the experts show up.
Take photos from the same spot every big storm. Jot down tide height, wind direction, whether the street flooded or just the sidewalk. Ask older neighbours where the water used to reach “back then”. This homemade record, combined with public tide data, often maps risk more clearly than a polished government brochure.
Let’s be honest: nobody really does this every single day. Yet the families who start paying attention early are often the ones who evacuate calmly, not in panic, when the big one comes.
The emotional labour here is real. You’re not just “adapting” to climate risk; you’re grieving small losses as they happen. The dune where you played as a kid now half-gone. The beach road closed more often. We’ve all been there, that moment when you realise the place that raised you might not be safe for your children.
One common mistake is to swing between denial and doom. Ignoring every warning until your ground floor floods is one extreme. Spending nights scrolling worst-case scenarios until you’re numb is the other. The middle path is boring, and it works. Join local coastal groups, skim the council meeting minutes, learn the difference between a 10-year storm and a 100-year storm.
*You don’t need to become an amateur climatologist; you just need to know your few key numbers: elevation, distance from shore, and flood history.* From there, choices get simpler: lift the electrics, store precious things higher, push for raised roads, or, in some cases, quietly start planning a move while you still can.
Scientists, to their credit, are starting to talk differently about these waves. Some admit they got the tone wrong. The shift is subtle but powerful when done well.
“From a physics standpoint, a 35 metre wave is breathtaking,” says coastal engineer Lara Mendes. “But I’ve learned that if I call it beautiful in a room full of people who just lost their seawall, I lose them. Now I say: this is what your grandchildren will face more often unless we act together.”
At community meetings, the most respected experts are the ones who bring numbers and humility. They translate jargon into kitchen-table language and share practical options instead of abstract models. That often means spelling out, in plain words, what can realistically be saved and what probably cannot.
- Ask for local, not global, data – “What does this mean for our street, this port, this village?”
- Request **worst-case AND most-likely scenarios** – Many plans soften the edges to avoid panic.
- Push for timelines you can feel – “In 5 years, you’ll notice X; in 20 years, Y will be normal.”
- Insist on clear responsibilities – Who pays when the sea wall fails? Who decides when to retreat?
- Document every promise – Verbal reassurance fades; written commitments shape budgets.
Why the same wave can mean three different futures
In the end, that 35 metre wave offshore is not just water and wind. It’s a mirror. To the big-wave surfer, it’s a life goal. To the researcher, it’s data they’ve waited a decade to catch. To the family in the low-lying bungalow, it’s a hint of what might be coming over the dunes in thirty years. One event, three emotional universes.
When news outlets splash those awe-inspiring photos on their front pages, they’re tapping into something primal: our fascination with being tiny in front of something vast. The trick, for all of us, is not to stop feeling that awe, but to widen the frame so fear and fairness also have a place in the picture. A wave can be both spectacular and deeply unfair in who it hurts.
There’s a quiet cultural shift already underway. Young coastal residents are becoming citizen scientists with cheap sensors and shared spreadsheets. Some surfers are turning into safety advocates, posting not just clips of giant drops but breakdowns of swell angles, rip currents, evacuation routes. Local councils are slowly learning that glossy brochures don’t compete with salty, lived experience.
The question isn’t whether scientists should celebrate natural wonders like 35 metre waves. The question is: who gets invited to that celebration, and who gets real protection as the party spills inland. The next time you see a viral clip of a tower of water collapsing in glittering spray, you might feel both the thrill and a small, sharp unease.
That tension is where the future of our coasts will be decided.
| Key point | Detail | Value for the reader |
|---|---|---|
| Colossal waves are both marvel and warning | 35 metre waves excite researchers and terrify residents living at sea level | Helps you read media stories with a more critical, grounded eye |
| Local knowledge matters as much as models | “Wave diaries” and community memory often reveal real risk faster than reports | Gives you a simple method to understand your own coastline’s future |
| Demand clear, practical communication | Ask experts for local data, timelines, and written responsibilities | Turns abstract climate talk into concrete decisions for your home and family |
FAQ:
- Question 1Are 35 metre waves becoming more common with climate change?Some data suggests extreme waves may become more frequent in certain regions as storm tracks and wind patterns shift, but trends aren’t the same everywhere. What’s clear is that even “rare” giants are more dangerous when sea levels are higher and coasts are already eroding.
- Question 2Should I move away if I live near the coast?Not automatically. Start by checking your elevation, flood history, and local adaptation plans. If you’re repeatedly dealing with flooding or no long-term protections exist, it can be wise to quietly plan options over a 5–20 year horizon instead of waiting for a crisis.
- Question 3Why do scientists sound so excited about dangerous waves?For them, extreme waves are rare chances to test models and understand how oceans behave in a warming world. That excitement can sound tone-deaf when you’re at risk, which is why many are rethinking how they talk about “beautiful” storms.
- Question 4Can massive waves like these hit beaches directly?The biggest 30–35 metre monsters usually form over deep water and lose height as they move shoreward. Still, even “smaller” 8–12 metre waves at the coast can cause severe flooding, structural damage, and coastal erosion when combined with high tides and storm surge.
- Question 5What’s one simple step I can take this year?Find your home on a local flood or storm-surge map, then ask your council what the 10-year and 50-year plans are for your stretch of coast. That single conversation often changes how you see every “spectacular” storm video that pops up in your feed.
