Ghost Wave - Chris Dixon [136]
“You go out in the midst of a storm like that, and you happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time—those waves get in phase and you find yourself in front of the highest one-tenths—at that point you’re in a world of hurt,” said Collins. “People just aren’t usually there to see it. When they do, it’s a huge phenomenon—that’s when you have a situation like the Andrea Gail. But really it’s a common occurrence. It happens all the time.”
A giant swell like this puts Collins in a touchy situation. The first time I ever fully appreciated this strange, central dilemma of his life also happened to be the first time I ever saw a giant wave in person. I traveled out to Todos Santos in February 1999 with Collins and Surfline’s Dave Gilovich in a primitive attempt to webcast the Reef@Todos big wave contest for Surfermag.com.
Collins had been responsible for the forecasting call, but as our boat rounded the corner, we saw nothing but a few surfers bobbing off a nasty crag of rock in a serene, open ocean. Tens of thousands had been spent by sponsors and poverty-stricken competing surfers, and it was flat as a lake. The God of Surfline cursed himself, but kept anxiously repeating, “It’s gonna show. It’s gotta show.”
Suddenly—and I’ll never forget this as long as I live—a humpbacked shape appeared off the rocks. A dreadlocked South African named Cass Collier dug hard, and this wave, the scariest damned thing I had ever seen from land or sea, swept beneath him at warp speed. I had no inkling a wave could move that fast. And I had no idea a human was capable of negotiating such a roaring, beastly thing. Seeing a 30- or 40-foot wave in a photo or video is one thing. Seeing one up close, watching that spray, and hearing that primal roar is just an otherworldy experience. Cass Collier stuck his drop. Collins breathed a sigh of deepest relief and looked like he’d just ridden his own 20-footer. The contest was on.
Fast forward a decade. As a titanic swell sweeps the Pacific, Sean’s phone lights up with calls from guys like Greg Long, Mike Parsons, and Laird Hamilton, all of whom want good, big, empty waves and need his advice. Sean doesn’t want to send hordes to Jaws, Todos, or Cortes Bank, nor does he want to throw a good friend off the scent. Like any newsroom editor, Collins knows the value of a Surfline exclusive, but on the other hand, Sean has a business to run broadcasting surf forecasts to the world. If he plays up a swell too much and lineups get crowded, he might catch hell—from Laird in particular. If he misses, or worse, undercalls a forecast, Surfline subscribers raise hell because he’s “blown a call.”
The purists who hate Surfline would say that’s just as well. They blame Collins for the crowds, anyway. And indeed, I don’t pity Collins, nor does he ask for sympathy. Being surfing’s fiber-optic kahuna is a pretty decent life—something surfing’s “beach bum” forefathers could have never imagined. Consider this, however: Sean’s mania for forecasting is the result of the same gnawing inquisitiveness that led him to sit on his roof endlessly counting and timing waves with a stopwatch, to carrying a huge old weatherfax machine into the Mexican desert and juicing it with a car battery, and to the later founding of Surfline. These were pioneering efforts, and they arise from an impulse Sean Collins can’t control. Some call Sean an Ahab, but really he is no less a high-sensation seeker than any other big wave Surfer he has ever spilled the beans to or argued with. He finds the same sort of rush in nailing the forecast for a great Pacific storm as Laird Hamilton, Mike Parsons, and Greg Long do in reaping the benefits of his knowledge. Plus, Sean Collins probably rides more empty waves than you, I, or anyone we know.
On December 4, Greg