Observations of the shape and group dynamics of rogue waves

Surface elevation records from two locations in the northeast Pacific are used to examine rogue waves and the relationship to wave groups. Three hundred individual rogue waves with heights greater than 2.2 times the significant wave height are found in analyzing >2 × 10 6 wave groups. In contrast to recent nonlinear modeling results, we do not find that rogue waves occur at the front of wave groups. There is a tendency for steep waves to occur at the front of a group, but these are not the largest waves of the group and do not meet the rogue wave criterion. Rogue waves are most commonly located in the center of the group, but their height ratio to the neighboring crest is greater than in the average wave group. Assessing group dynamics in terms of spectral width suggests that random superposition of nonlinear waves is sufficient to explain the observations of individual rogue waves.