People on the list keep talking about how big waves can get in open water. Following is a short paragraph the local paper reprinted from the LA Times syndicate. "Some of the more than 200 super tankers and container ships that have disappeared during the past 20 years are now thought to have been sunk by monster waves of up to 120 feet. A team of oceanographers at the Technical University in Berlin recreated in a tank the gigantic "one-off seas" capable of snapping a vessel in half. Research leader Gunther Clauss said that slow-moving waves were caught up by a succession of faster waves, traveling at more than twice their speed. He said, "What happens then is that the waves simply pile up on top of each other to create a monster. Any vessel caught by one of these has little chance of surviving." The QE2 passenger liner survived a direct hit over its bow in 1995 from a wave estimated to have been 100 feet in height." Bill Martin Telegraph Hill