North Pacific Signals Open Season with Solid Swell Lining up for Hawaii and California

The North Pacific storm track is quickly escalating through early November. Leaving behind an average October, Hawaii and California each picked up their largest NW swell of the season - thus far - during the first three days of the new month, with plenty more to come over the next couple of weeks.

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The emerging pattern has El Niño's fall signature and, interestingly, if an XL northwest swell verifies in Northern California around mid-month, it would line up nearly to the day with the first XL swell of the season in 1997 (another very strong El Niño year).

The next swell to spread across the North Pacific is developing now as it tracks under the Aleutian Islands toward the Gulf of Alaska. It didn't quite have the juice of its predecessor but has still looked more than respectable with a large area of 30-40 knot wind and satellite-verified seas over 35 feet. Pumping surf moves into Hawaii on Thursday - albeit with very strong trades, fueled partially by a potential tropical cyclone passing to the south - and semi-groomed to somewhat lumpy conditions.

The West Coast will get in on the action by the end of the week and into the weekend with beautiful conditions. Light wind and warm air temps, along with still incredibly warm water temps, especially by November standards. Per usual with the more northerly-direction swells, the bulk of the size will show for breaks north of Point Conception. SoCal will be fun, and there will be some peaks at the combo breaks with the latest SSW swell running.

The recent and upcoming swells are the start of what will be a series of strong NW to WNW swells through at least mid-month. It's still a little too early to get into the specific size and timing details of swells beyond the next few days, but both Hawaii and the West Coast should see a new pulse roughly every 2-3 days through the next couple weeks.

The Islands will be under strong ENE trades through most of the run, with manageable but not ideal conditions. California will see great conditions later this week and especially this weekend, before conditions potentially break down early to mid-next week sometime (9th-12th range), especially for Northern California. Odds are increasing we'll see at least one XL swell for Northern California, too.

As a bonus, the South Pacific isn't showing any signs of a significant slowdown. We have a series of SW to SSW swells incoming over the next two weeks as well. Nothing major, but a couple pulses look quite fun on their own. The combo spots will see some good to possibly great periods of surf through the first half of November.

Forecast Details: Hawaii Analysis | NorCal Analysis | CenCal Analysis | SoCal Analysis | Charts