TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands Windguru on Friday

All - windguru is showing a step increase in wave period and a shift to the north in wave direction, starting late Friday and lasting for 2 days, before snapping back into a more usual pattern. Anyone know what's causing this? Seems like a dramatic change. I wondered if it was an anomaly in their models, but it's shown the same thing for several days now. We plan to be at JVD through this period, and I was thinking about White Bay or Diamond Cay, but am now wondering if Great Harbour might be a more comfortable overnight. Thanks all!

Great Harbour & Diamond Cay should be protected, but you definitely don't want to be in White Bay in a North ground swell.

http://www.opc.ncep.noaa.gov/shtml/A_96hrsfc.gif
L994 and associated cold front

It's a normal North Swell caused by storms off the US east coast. It's a little late in the season for a north swell but the forecasts for swell tend to be very accurate. It starts Friday afternoon and continues through Sunday. I would avoid White Bay and Cane Garden Bay during that period. Forecast is for a 4 foot swell which is not large but would make a anchorage uncomfortable.

That swell will be minimal and may not even make it inside the BVI. Rain the next few days is the larger threat:

http://passageweather.com/maps/leeward/rain/021.png



Swell is always the result of days old storms and wind many hundreds if not thousands of miles away.