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The Draupner wave, a single giant wave measured on New Year's Day 1995, finally confirmed the existence of freak waves, which had previously been considered near-mythical.

Close-up of the event, taken from Paul Taylor's paper.

The Draupner wave or New Year's wave is the name of the first rogue wave to be detected by a measuring instrument, occurring at the Draupner platform in the North Sea off the coast of Norway on January 1, 1995. Prior to this measurement, such freak waves were known to exist only through anecdotal evidence provided by those who had encountered them at sea.

Minor damage was inflicted on the platform during this event, confirming the validity of the reading made by a downwards-pointing laser sensor. In an area with significant wave height of approximately 12 metres (39 ft), a freak wave with a maximum wave height of 25.6 metres (84 ft) occurred (peak elevation was 18.5 metres (61 ft)). Engineer Paul Taylor estimated the Draupner wave was a one in 200,000 wave.

References

• Sverre Haver (5 August 2003). Freak wave event at Draupner jacket January 1 1995. (PDF)
• Paul H. Taylor. The shape of the Draupner Wave of 1 January 1995 (PDF) retrieved 20 January 2007.
• Youtube. Video reconstruction of rogue waves, from BBC documentary.