AI Predicts Rogue Waves Up to Five Minutes in Advance

A new artificial intelligence model developed by mechanical engineers Thomas Breunung and Balakumar Balachandran from the University of Maryland can predict rogue waves—massive water ridges that can surprise ships and beachgoers—up to five minutes in advance, ScienceNews reported yesterday.

The AI was trained using 16 million data points from 172 ocean buoys, successfully forecasting 75% of rogue wave arrivals one minute ahead and about 70% at five minutes, the source mentioned.

Remarkably, the model performed well even at locations without prior training data. This breakthrough tool could enhance maritime safety, as rogue waves have previously resulted in 386 fatalities and the sinking of 24 ships between 2011 and 2018.

The researchers believe that improved AI architectures and more data could further increase prediction accuracy.