The Slurpee Waves of Nantucket
February 25, 2015 7:51 PM   Subscribe

Dang! Have you ever seen waves get so cold they turn to slurpee? Get seawater cool enough, but not too cold; keep it agitated, and you get some beautiful waves.
posted by peripatetron errant (38 comments total) 44 users marked this as a favorite
 
Wow. That's amazing. I want to get my hand in it to see what it feels like. (Actually, I don't really want to, but I wish I could.)
posted by alms at 7:54 PM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


Wow!
posted by rtha at 7:57 PM on February 25, 2015


Warning: Any sense of wonder or awe will be promptly dispelled by reading the comments.
posted by Cold Lurkey at 7:57 PM on February 25, 2015


It's just a different kind of wonder, that's all.
posted by alms at 8:00 PM on February 25, 2015 [4 favorites]


Yeah, seriously, avoid the comments, they're worse-than-usual for the internet.
posted by peripatetron errant at 8:02 PM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


It takes just one man from Nantucket to ruin the place for the rest of us.
posted by BiggerJ at 8:13 PM on February 25, 2015 [16 favorites]


Slurpee is good. I also thought of taffy.
posted by notyou at 8:15 PM on February 25, 2015


Salty fishy seaweedy slurpee.
posted by blue_beetle at 8:16 PM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


These must be surfed.
posted by humanfont at 8:17 PM on February 25, 2015


gorgeous!
posted by PinkMoose at 8:37 PM on February 25, 2015


What a fantastic set of pics! Great find!
posted by MissySedai at 8:54 PM on February 25, 2015


Oh: The next post was deleted while I was reading the links, must have been a double, it was interesting about urbanism but anyway...

Slurpy waves are cool, literally.

Having been in cold water, there are no balls, regardless of suction.
posted by Samuel Farrow at 8:57 PM on February 25, 2015


Huh. I'm always surprised when there turns out to be something about fricking cold weather that I have not yet experienced in my life.

So much the better that this phenomenon is, in addition to being new to me, also beautiful.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:16 PM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


Really interesting pictures. Thinking about that cola slurpee now. If it wasn't 4 degrees out, I would head down to the 7-11 right now.
posted by 724A at 9:37 PM on February 25, 2015


I want to see what they look like in motion. Is there video I'm missing? :(
posted by maryr at 9:52 PM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


Here's a sort of related video from a previous post of mine.
posted by Aizkolari at 9:54 PM on February 25, 2015 [8 favorites]


But I wanna see them in waves...
posted by maryr at 10:03 PM on February 25, 2015


Nantucket meetup? Horace can probably borrow a helicopter from Harvard to get out there.
posted by Aizkolari at 10:13 PM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]


There once was a beach in Nantucket
That looked like a Slurpee had struck it
Jon's wife, who was Nan
Came with GoPro as planned
But as for the footage Nantucket
posted by jimmythefish at 10:15 PM on February 25, 2015 [35 favorites]


That's stunning. I'd love to watch those in person (for five minutes, wearing something very warm).

(Also, comments didn't seem horrifying to me - did they mod a bunch of stuff away or am I not getting it?)
posted by en forme de poire at 11:11 PM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


Really interesting pictures. Thinking about that cola slurpee now. If it wasn't 4 degrees out, I would head down to the 7-11 right now.--724A

Interesting that you should say that because I had heard that if you want to recreate what it is like in Boston in the winter, you pour a bunch of cola slurpees into your bathtub, then step in and walk around in it. Maybe this year you need to fill it up all the way.
posted by eye of newt at 11:18 PM on February 25, 2015 [2 favorites]


Wow. That was beautiful but fucking uncanny. I was fascinated at first but soon couldn't click away fast enough.
posted by two or three cars parked under the stars at 11:19 PM on February 25, 2015 [1 favorite]




That video makes it look like the waves aren't actually slush, but rather normal waves with lots of slushy stuff floating on the surface. Which would be less impressive, but it would make sense, wouldn't it?
posted by teponaztli at 11:43 PM on February 25, 2015


What's wrong with the comments? Seem fine to me.
posted by Sebmojo at 11:58 PM on February 25, 2015


THAT IS SO AWESOME! You could build a multi-colored slush/sandcastle on that beach!
posted by Joe in Australia at 11:59 PM on February 25, 2015


Metafilter: Any sense of wonder or awe will be promptly dispelled by reading the comments.
posted by jaduncan at 2:04 AM on February 26, 2015 [15 favorites]


Gorgeous. The comments probably got moderated in the interim.
posted by childofTethys at 4:22 AM on February 26, 2015


I suppose there has to be some interim state between ocean water and ocean ice, the moving water is going to make it difficult for ice to form. There is so much interesting physics going on there!
posted by asok at 5:19 AM on February 26, 2015


These are really cool, thanks! I'm sending the pictures to my whole family.

Does anyone know what beach this is? I would guess Surfside but I'm not sure.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 6:26 AM on February 26, 2015


mutters: Nice, I guess, but still no Lake Superior ice caves. (Picture #8 looks like an outtake from the movie "Frozen.")

Also: the heaving, seething waters of Lake Superior apparently hide the winter home of Cthulhu in this video [SLYT].
posted by wenestvedt at 6:41 AM on February 26, 2015 [2 favorites]


I can only find a link through Facebook, but if it works, this is 19 seconds of ice waves at Cisco Beach on Nantucket.
posted by feistycakes at 7:07 AM on February 26, 2015 [5 favorites]


I want to get my hand in it to see what it feels like.

It's cold slush. I've made it in tanks and seen it in the wild. These are amazing pictures of it though. I don't know if I've seen much better.

The water isn't changing viscosity (much), but the blanket of small ice/snow particles weigh down the water waves to create this effect. It's quite dramatic how strong a dampening can be depending on the size and type of ice present, the drop off in waves as they enter a slush ice field is exponential.

"Wave damping" is critical to get right for good ocean and ice models. These affects everything from weather forecasts and ship safety to wildlife protection and human impact studies, especially north (and south) of 60.
posted by bonehead at 8:50 AM on February 26, 2015 [11 favorites]


Thanks for the videos, knave and feistycakes! That was way more awesome to me than the static pictures.
posted by maryr at 10:02 AM on February 26, 2015


Oh, come on! How cool is this? Nature is amazing.
posted by Joey Michaels at 12:26 PM on February 26, 2015


Their once were some waves from Nantucket
Where water's too thick for a bucket
The waves almost froze
And nobody knows
When you won't have to swim in a jacket.
posted by Violet Hour at 3:19 PM on February 27, 2015


I've surfed waves like these. New England surfers get used to ice or move south! Ever had an eye freeze shut while surfing? That's a blast too...
posted by blaneyphoto at 5:28 PM on February 27, 2015


The photographer has put a bunch more photos of the slurpee waves up on his website. If you want a print he's offering a 25% discount now through midnight Thursday with promo code "SLURPEE25".
posted by alms at 7:55 PM on March 9, 2015


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