Caribbean Princess - The Sea Days and Beaufort Force Scale

I’ve been meaning to do a post in regards to what our sea days looked like on a cruise ship.  During this cruise adventure, we felt a lot of motion on the ship and experienced a range of motion not felt before.  We were able to see a glass or mirror-like flat surface on the water to the extreme where we could see large waves/swells.

Princess provides us with a “log of the cruise” for each leg of our cruising adventure.  Each day the Captain reports distance traveled, speed, sky, temperature, and wind.  I was more interested in the wind and decided to do some research on what’s called the Beaufort Wind Force Scale.  The scale is based on a scale of 0 to 12 and relates wind to observed conditions at sea or on land.  In our case, we are interested in sea conditions.

Here’s a summary of our sea days and what the log captured based on the Beaufort scale.  Now remember we were on a 14-day cruise (B2B) and came back into FLL on Day 9 of our adventure.  Here what the log captured:

FIRST WEEK

Day 2 Sea Day:  North Easterly Beaufort Force 5
They describe this as a “fresh” breeze with winds at 17-21 knots or 19-24 mph.  Wave heights 6-9 ft.  Moderate waves of some length and many white caps.  Small amounts of spray.

Day 3 Sea Day:  North Easterly Beaufort Force 5
Another “fresh” breeze day.

Day 7 Sea Day:  North Easterly Beaufort Force 6
This is described as a “strong” breeze with winds at 22-27 knots or 25-31 mph.  Wave heights of 9-13 ft.  Long waves begin to form.  White foam crests are very frequent.  Some airborne spray is present.

Day 8 Sea Day:  Northerly Beaufort Force 5
Another “fresh” breeze day.

SECOND WEEK

Day 10 Sea Day:  West North Westerly Beaufort Force 9
Do you see the number 9?  That is considered to be “strong/severe gale” with winds at 41-47 knots or 47-54 mph.  Wave heights of 23-32 ft.  High waves whose crests sometimes roll over.  Dense foam is blown along wind direction.  Large amounts of airborne spray may begin to reduce visibility.




Day 14 Sea Day:  South Easterly Beaufort Force 2
Considered to be “light” breeze with winds 4-6 knots or 4-7 mph.  Wave heights 1-2 ft.  Small wavelets.  Crests have a glassy appearance and do not break.

I know on this day the Beaufort scale was much lower as the sea was like a mirror and sometimes I saw ripples that had an “appearance of scales” in the water.