![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/kelvin-waves.png\")
<\/p>\nWhat are Kelvin waves, and how could they affect San Diego?<\/p>\n
Kelvin waves traveling through the Pacific Ocean could raise sea levels along San Diego\u2019s coast this winter, potentially increasing the risk of coastal flooding and beach erosion if stronger storms arrive during the El Ni\u00f1o year.<\/p>\n
Dillon Amaya earned his Ph.D. from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego and is now an assistant professor of marine science at North Carolina State University, said Kelvin waves are not massive, surfable waves or walls of water approaching the coastline. Instead, they are coastally trapped waves that can elevate sea levels by about 6 to 12 inches.<\/p>\n
Kelvin waves are generated by changes in winds over the equatorial Pacific Ocean.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are generated by what are called westerly wind bursts, which is a sort of a sporadic weakening of the trade winds, which normally hold up a lot of warm water in the far western equatorial Pacific. So when those die off or when they fall apart, that water is essentially sloshing back towards the eastern equatorial Pacific, back towards South America. And as it goes, it suppresses upwelling and drives warming, and that’s what we call El Nino,\u201d Amaya said.<\/p>\n
The waves do not stop after reaching the South American coastline. Their energy travels north along the coasts of Central America and Mexico before eventually reaching the West Coast of the United States.<\/p>\n
One Kelvin wave can travel about 15,000 miles. Amaya was tracking one near Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and expected two to three of the waves during the winter.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, right now I’m tracking a wave that is around Puerto Vallarta in Mexico. It should enter the Gulf of California in the next day or so. Once it’s in the Gulf of California, it’ll take about 11 days or so to transit that interior inland sea. Once it arrives in Cabo, it’s about a week, seven days to get to San Diego, another three days to LA, and another three days to San Francisco. These things move at a pretty predictable speed of about six miles per hour,\u201d Amaya said.<\/p>\n
Researchers can track Kelvin waves using high-resolution observations and ocean models, allowing them to monitor the waves as they move through the ocean.<\/p>\n
Although a 6- to 12-inch rise in sea level may not sound dramatic on its own, Amaya said the elevated sea state could become more consequential when combined with winter storms and increased wave energy.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithin San Diego coastal waters, you should expect the background sea state to rise by that 6 to 12 inches and stay that way pretty much through the springtime. And so as that sea state remains elevated, if you get these compounding effects of stronger storms, increasing wave energy, that’s going to increase your risk of coastal flooding, also increases issues related to beach erosion,\u201d Amaya said.<\/p>\n
The impact will depend in part on the storms that reach San Diego during the El Ni\u00f1o winter. Kelvin waves can set the stage for how those storms interact with an already elevated ocean along the coastline.<\/p>\n
Their effects are not limited to coastal flooding and erosion. Kelvin waves can also warm the upper ocean and contribute to marine heat waves. Those warmer conditions could bring more whales and tropical fish closer to shore.<\/p>\n
This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC San Diego. AI tools helped convert the story to a digital article, and an NBC San Diego journalist edited the article for publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What are Kelvin waves, and how could they affect San Diego? Kelvin waves traveling through the Pacific Ocean…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":850742,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,359526,79],"class_list":["post-850741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-san-diego-weather","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=850741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850741\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/850742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}