Gallery: The Indian Ocean Swell (so far)

The 2.5 million square mile storm that’s been swirling through the Indian Ocean has delivered on all its promises. While it’ll now head towards Fiji, Tahiti and ultimately Mexico, it’s been putting in some amazing work on Australia’s Western Coast and many high-surf traffic parts of Indonesia (think: Mentawais, Bukit Peninsula, etc).

First, let’s party at The Right, which was particularly more consistent than, uh, ever: “It was as big as I’ve seen it out there,” says photographer Chris Gurney. “But the swell seemed to have a lot of energy behind it, going through drawn out pulses where it was non-stop. It’s also stuck around for longer than most swells seem to.” This swell was never going to bang like a sawn-off… it’s a rattling uzi. Catch the bullets if you can!

“When Mark (Mathews) said he wanted to get a couple of waves at The Right on the soft top, I thought he was joking,” photog Calum Macaulay tells Stab. Can you believe Chalk took on Oz’s craziest wave with nothing but a foamie? “But the joke was on me,” continues Calum. “He ended up surfing consecutive days on it and was loving it, getting barreled off his head.” Photo: Cmacimages.com.au

And, here’s Chris Shanahan at The Right. “Chris is a friendly local guy from down that way and as such gets a lot of really good waves,” says photographer Chris Gurney, who fired this off. “He and the rest of the local guys seemed to time the swell pulses perfectly, arriving on cue when it starting kicking each day.” Photo: Chris Gurney

“Jarryd Foster (pictured here) is from West Oz originally but lives in Tasmania these days,” says Chris. “He makes a habit of being home for the biggest swells and took out last year’s Oakley Biggest Wave Award. He and tow-partner Mick Corbett missed the first day of the swell but made up for it on Saturday and Sunday.” Indeed they did – no doubt you’ve seen Mick’s Sequence You’ll Love, currently inflating the homepage. Photo: Chris Gurney

“Jeremy Hocquard is one of those guys who can ride any kind of craft well, paddle or tow,” says Chris of the gent you see pictured here. And in case you’ve been wondering who the poor soul scratching underneath Mick Corbett’s wave in our Sequence You’ll Love was… “On Saturday afternoon Jeremy flicked off an insider to see one of the biggest waves of the entire swell in front of him. His flotation vest meant he couldn’t properly swim down and he went straight back over the falls with it, one of the craziest things I’ve ever witnessed.” Photo: Chris Gurney

“Phil Read or ‘Choppa’ is an ex West Coast Eagles AFL player who now gets his kicks paddling and towing into big barrels,” Mr Gurney enlightens. “He usually teams up with Mark Mathews and found himself in this unfortunate situation early on Saturday morning.” Photo: Chris Gurney

“It was as big as I’ve seen it out at The Right, but the swell seemed to have a lot of energy behind it, going through drawn out pulses where it was non-stop,” says Chris. “It’s also stuck around for longer than most swells seem to. At around midday it was crazy, no wind, sunshine and some absolute bombs.”

And now, a brief detour to warmer water. “Padang (pictured here) was two or three times overhead with very consistent sets of five or six,” says photog Fredrico Vanno of the Saturday you see pictured here. It sure is a good time to be in Bali. Photo: Fredrico Vanno

“It was about three or four times over head on Saturday at Uluwatu (pictured) with sets of five or six every 20 minutes or so,” says Fredrico. “I think tomorrow and Monday should be even bigger and much better!” Photo: Fredrico Vanno

We’ll now shed rubber and head to Kanduis. “Normally these kind of swells get pretty hyped up out here and it’s hard not to get caught up in it,” says photographer John Barton, who’s images you’ll see below. “Winds out here are normally really hard to predict so quite often when swells hit they can come with the wrong winds or the surf windows get cut short by big tides. But this one couldn’t have hit more perfectly. Light all-day offshores and neat tides meant that guys could surf it all day… and they have been for three days straight. More snapped boards than I could count, stitches, concussions and more perfect waves than I can remember ever seeing in one session. Most of us that live out here and got to be a part of it all have our minds blown. Don’t think I’ve seen that level of collective surfing out there before. Everyone was feeding off each other’s energy and charging just as hard as each other.”

Craig Anderson, who’s currently here shooting with Kai Neville, formulates a line on a rather sizeable set. When a couple of trains steam through the lineup, there’s bound to be wreckage. “I saw Ando run down a stray board at high speed on a bomb,” says our shooter. Photo: John Barton

If there’s big barrels to be found, then Dean Morrison will probably be in the mix. And, not holding back. According to John, “Dingo scored 11 stitches and a mild concussion.”. Photo: John Barton

Jean Dasilva made noise at Pipeline during the 14/15 Pipe season. He sure is kinky for da bombing left barrels. Photo: John Barton

Koa Smith scored the longest-ever barrel at Namibia last year, then some of the biggest barrels of the year in Mexico, and new he’s all up in this swell at Kanduis. Miss nothing, regret nothing. Photo: John Barton

Nate Behl does some fine work around the Ments. You’ve seen his clips. Photo: John Barton

Parker Coffin is back from injury and obviously loving it. It wasn’t all green envy (“Parker got bounced pretty hard at one point,” tells John), but he got to peel the corner off some fluoro canvases like this. Photo: John Barton

Paulo Moura, Cristo Redentor a long way from Rio. “Paulo was on fire,” says John. Photo: John Barton

Well, shit. “This swell couldn’t have hit more perfectly,” says John. Photo: John Barton