The Perfect Ride - Biggest Wave of the Season - 65ft Tom Butler

This is Tom Butler's wave ridden in Nazare, Portugal on December 14, 2018. The conditions were perfect on this swell, perfect wind, glassy ocean (by Nazare standards), and a PUMPING swell. The charts were showing the swell at 30-35FT, which in Nazare terms that means waves excess of 65 feet! This was the biggest set of the day, and Tom with his tow partner Sebastian Steudtner were in the best possible position to score this bombing set wave. Me and the cameramen on this cliffs were thinking this wave was about 65ft, without a doubt a monster! After reviewing the footage, and calculating Tom's height, it was in fact closer to 70ft+. We didn't know it at the time, but this wave made history on a global scale! I was lucky to be there, and was the only person to film this wave from a drone! The drone camera lens doesn't give the full feel of the wave, but make sure to check out some of me friends who were there to film this wave from the cliffs with a telephoto lens. Pedro Miranda has a great shot of this wave on his Youtube channel!

Wave height is one of the most controversial things in surfing, as there's no clear way (not yet) to measure a wave with 100% accuracy.