We have a major storm a comin’ starting Friday. If the winds the last few days were uncomfortable, wait till you see the weekend. We are looking at gusts upwards of 45 MPH. Coastal flooding is definitely possible. Oak Orchard has flooded the past few days at Chiefs Road, which is normal for that area, but a good indication of more water in the Inland Bays. The NE winds stacked up a lot of water. The winds the past few days pushed a lot of water into the tide pool areas on the beaches. That water broke through and created huge cuts on the beach. The one in Ocean City was massive, someone called it a new inlet. No worries there is not a new inlet. If you do go to the beach this weekend, keep in mind water could build up behind your vehicle, do not drive through it. You will experience a sand blast like no other as well. The good news is there won’t be any flies. The full moon Sunday will add to the heavy tides.
Depending on what model you look at we will either see very little rain or a lot of rain. I know that is not what anyone wants to hear but the weather folks are having a tough time calling this storm. The one thing we will definitely see is a lot of strong heavy winds. This will start Friday and last into Sunday, but calm down by then. I know a lot of you are hoping to see the full bloodmoon, but I do not know how clear the skies will be Sunday night. Even after the winds calm down we will still have stirred up waters. The Indian River Inlet looked like chocolate milk yesterday, but the small blues were hitting. Expect the fishing to pick back up after the northeast winds calm down. I checked out Broadkill Beach yesterday and it seems to be fairing well with the heavy winds and surf, though it appears it lost some distance to the surf edge.
The water temperatures are steady dropping. Masseys Landing hit a new low today of 68.8 degrees and peaked to 71.9 degrees at low tide. The Delaware Bay near Lewes is around 69 degrees and the upper Delaware Bay and River is 73 degrees near Delaware City. The offshore temperature is 73 degrees. These sudden lower temperatures are getting the striped bass excited they have been schooling up all over Delaware’s coast and waterways. That makes for some fun fishing. The inland bays and Masseys Landing has seen some nice shorty fishing early mornings and after dark. If the temperatures keep plummeting at this rate the fall run will be here before you know it, but one concern is these Northeast winds will chase/push the mullet away. We will have to wait and see what happens. There is still a lot of fish in our waters for catching.
Fish On!!
Rich King