The Eureka office of the National Weather Service is warning of a high risk of sneaker waves Saturday due to a long-period westerly swell of around 6 to 9 feet, with a hazardous beach statement in effect from late tonight through Saturday night. Sneaker waves are large powerful waves that can appear suddenly after a long […]
Ocean
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Waiting Game
Fishermen are optimistic by nature, but spending $5,000 on new crab gear this year is still a risky proposition for commercial crabbers like Curt Wilson. The equipment is expensive, prone to being lost and there has been no certainty in recent years that the commercial Dungeness crab season will start on time, if at all. […]
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The Gray Whale Die-off
With a bulbous upper jaw jutting out from an elongated head dappled by a patchwork of barnacles, the gray whale may not cut the same sleek figure as its oceanic cousin — and mortal enemy — the orca, which recently made some forays into Humboldt Bay. But the whales named after their slate coloring can […]
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Offshore Wind Energy Project Inches Forward on the North Coast
Efforts to build a wind energy farm off the North Coast took a substantial step forward this week, when the Redwood Coast Energy Authority and a consortium of private companies submitted a lease application to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. The application seeks site control of about 70 square miles of ocean approximately […]
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Supes Take Needed Step to Protect Our Coast
The Humboldt County Board of Supervisors has joined other California lawmakers, business leaders, environmental groups and government agencies in rejecting the Trump administration’s attempts to open up the California coast to new offshore oil drilling. At its July 25 meeting, the board unanimously passed a resolution in support of the nearby Greater Farallones and Cordell […]
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Survey your sins
Ah, the magical storm drain. Alligators live down there, we know, and escapees, and gourmand rats — fantastical beings swimming around in lurksome joy. Plus, of course, all that junk you’ve let wash into it, too: pet poop, cigarette butts, wrappers, caps, oil, chemicals and other detritus that drifts from fingers, drips off cars and […]
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Ocean Swimmer Dies
A 21-year-old from Tulare died yesterday afternoon after being rescued from the ocean off of Samoa Beach, according to the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office. Matthew Bryant Garcia had gone swimming with a friend, and disappeared in the surf, says the release. A passerby called 911 at about 4:30 p.m. In two minutes rescuers were on […]
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Be Careful: 20-Foot Waves
OK, that’s it: We’re calling wrap-it wonder Christo to throw some CAUTION around that big wavy gray danger of a Pacific that’s constantly slavering at our doorstep. Either that or we could simply heed the latest warning from NOAA and the U.S. Coast Guard — this time, to beware the 20-foot waves coming our way […]
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King for a Day
The Journal was invited to take a New Year’s Eve float on Humboldt Bay to check out the king tides that came lapping at our shores. Some of the year’s highest tides give ocean watchers (like Humboldt Baykeeper, who provided this tour) a chance to see the coastal fallout of rising oceans. It’s a bit difficult to […]
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Treacherous Maw
It’s a calm, blue-sky day out here on the north jetty — the sort of day when the sun’s heat actually reaches the skin. The wind is slight. The ocean’s a quiet rumple in the Humboldt Bay entrance channel, between here and the south jetty — moving just enough to elicit languid dingding-dingdinging from a […]
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Humboldt Outside
With December comes the freeze. Moisture settles as fluff on the high peaks and passes, slicks roads and parking lots, frosts rooftops and windshields and, on occasion, bounces pellet-like onto the coastal landscape. Night-dark comes early; headlights barely pick out that elk herd clustered on the highway shoulder, or the thick-furred bear racing across a […]
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Rough Waters
Faced with a shrinking pool of funding, local environmental nonprofit Humboldt Baykeeper is in the process of dramatically downsizing its organization. The office staff was reportedly laid off recently, and last week Executive Director Jessica Hall learned that she, too, was being laid off. Only Policy Director Jennifer Kalt, whose position has been reduced to part-time, […]