It was exactly 40 years ago, that a massive winter swell hit the north and west shores of the islands. Many surfers consider it to be the biggest swell in recorded history to ever hit Oahu's north shore.
The four-day swell peaked at midnight on December 2, 1969. State senator Fred Hemmings, who surfed with Eddie Aikau, remembers:
"We got to Makaha and obviously the north shore was closed out. Everything was breaking out on the horizon. You couldn't even paddle out to a location on the north shore, it was so wild" said Hemmings.
"Well, the '69 swell produced waves up to 50 feet. We think. I wasn't out. There were a few guys out" said Ricky Grigg.
Grigg is now an oceanographer at the University of Hawaii. He rode the swell - in southern California, where was studying at the Scripps Institute of oceanography.
"Yeah, I was going to Scripps at the time, and I caught a wave off Rumor Beach, La Jolla. Same swell, three days later. It was about 20 feet."
Grigg says he's 95 percent sure about Monday's forecast for mammoth waves. The weather systems that will produce the swell may be more powerful than the one that gave rise to the giant swell of '69.
