King Tides here through Thanksgiving

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With the sun, Earth and moon aligned just right, southern California — all of the West Coast actually — will be experiencing the year’s highest tides, as of today. Officially known as the “perigean spring tides,” they occur several times a year when the sun and moon are at their closest points to Earth, and aligned with each other. The colloquial term for the tides is “King Tides.”

Both the sun and moon affect the tides with their gravitational pull, but when all three celestial bodies are aligned just right, we get the King Tides.

Expect flooding in low-lying areas close to the beach; roads, walkways and property will be affected. Although high tide occurs twice a day, it will be at it’s highest in the mornings, reaching eight feet in some places and close to seven feet for most of the California coast.

The National Weather Service says we can expect the highest tides on Wednesday, although we’ll have very high tides today and Thursday, Thanksgiving, as well.

For examples here are the predicted tides for three areas in Southern California.

Long Beach:
Nov 24, 2015, 7:17 am, 6.84′
Nov 25, 2015, 7:56 am, 7:01′
Nov 26, 2015, 8:36 am, 6.97′

Santa Monica
Nov 24, 2015, 7:20 am, 6.74′
Nov 25, 2015, 7:59 am, 6.9′
Nov 26, 2015, 8:39 am, 6.86′

La Jolla
Nov 24, 2015, 7:12 am, 6.58′
Nov 25, 2015, 7:51 am,
Nov 26, 2015, 8:31 am, 6.73′

We can expect King Tides again in December and January as well. With El Niño, the King Tides will be especially strong this winter.

 Photo above: the Marine Room in La Jolla as it is hit with high surf in October (YouTube)