On Saturday morning, Cal Poly Graduate Engineering students held public information sessions about King Tides at Avila Beach and Morro Bay beaches.
The tides can be seen along these beaches from November 13th through 15th and community members are encouraged to take photos and submit them for research.
Jonathan Maas, a Civil Engineering Graduate Student at Cal Poly, explained the concept behind the King Tides.
"Basically when the sun and the moon align they both have gravitational forces which pulls the tides a little bit closer to them, so it causes high tides," Maas said. "This year, we’re seeing around 7-foot tides, which is quite a bit more than the 3-foot tides we see on an average day."
Around 9 a.m. Saturday, the tides at Avila Beach peaked.
“Today is the apex or highest peak of those tides," Maas said. "You can see there’s less sand than there usually is.“
An oceanographer and researcher with Cal Poly’s Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, Serena Lee, said recording the tides at different times and locations along the coast can provide useful information.
“By observing and documenting king tides, we’re essentially looking into the future,” Lee said. “It’s a powerful visual that helps us understand what higher sea levels might mean for our local communities and environment.”
According to the California King Tides Project, these high tides can be dangerous during storms or floods.
However, based on information from Cal Poly's Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, measuring these tides can help determine where ocean levels fluctuate and what areas are at risk of flooding.
Executive Director for the Central Coast Aquarium, Christy Kasajarian, also spread awareness about the tides and said they can provide wildlife viewing opportunities.
"It’s just kind of a cool phenomenon that we can see," Kasarjian said, "It also allows for some pretty neat tide pooling because there’s extreme high tides. There’s also extreme low tides, so you can go out and maybe see more critters that you wouldn’t normally... Tide pool animals can be sea stars, hermit crabs, anemones, you might even find some octopus, things like that."
Tom and Annalee Luhman, visitors to the Central Coast, said the high tides offer bird-watching opportunities too.
"High tides push the shorebirds in closer and when you’re at Morro, the shorebirds are usually so far out you can’t see them," Tom Luhman said. "But when a high tide occurs, you come in close and you get a better look at them."
Click this linkto submit photos you took of the king tides.
More information on the California King Tides Project is available here.
