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Guide

Small craft advisories and the two marine zones

Checked September 11, 2026 against the National Weather Service office in Medford, National Weather Service marine definitions and federal rules.

The Marine tile repeats the National Weather Service forecast and any advisory for the two stretches of nearshore water on this coast. Here is which water each one covers, and what the words mean.

An advisory is a forecast for open water. It is not a bar report. Whether you may cross a bar is the Coast Guard’s call, and a bar can be restricted on a day with no advisory. Check the bar report, the forecast and the water itself before you go.

The two zones

ZoneWaterTowns on the board
PZZ350Coastal waters from Florence to Cape Blanco, out 10 nautical milesReedsport, Winchester Bay, North Bend, Coos Bay, Charleston, Coquille, Bandon
PZZ356Coastal waters from Cape Blanco to Point St. George, California, out 10 nautical milesPort Orford, Gold Beach, Brookings

Cape Blanco, just north of Port Orford, is the line between them. The board puts your side of the cape first and the other side second. Beyond 10 miles out are two more zones, PZZ370 and PZZ376, which run from 10 to 60 nautical miles offshore. The board does not carry them.

Marine zones cover the ocean, not rivers or bays. Coquille and Reedsport are shown PZZ350 because it is the water you reach by running downriver and over the bar at Bandon or Winchester Bay.

What the words mean

These are the National Weather Service’s definitions. Winds are sustained winds, or frequent gusts, which the weather service defines as gusts for two hours or more in a 12-hour forecast period.

ProductWhat it means
Small Craft AdvisoryOn the West Coast: winds of 21 to 33 knots, and/or waves over 10 feet, or seas steeper than the local limit.
Gale WarningWinds of 34 to 47 knots (39 to 54 mph).
Storm WarningWinds of 48 to 63 knots (55 to 73 mph).
Hurricane Force Wind WarningWinds of 64 knots (74 mph) or more.
Hazardous Seas WarningWave height and/or steepness at or above the local warning limit. It is about the water, not the wind.
Watch (Gale Watch, Hazardous Seas Watch)The risk is up, but whether it happens, and where and when, is still uncertain.

The weather service says there is no precise definition of a small craft: any vessel that may be adversely affected by small craft advisory conditions counts as one.

Steep seas, not just big ones

In this region, small craft advisories and hazardous seas warnings are based partly on wave steepness, which combines wave height with wave period, and each forecast office sets its own limits. So an advisory can be in force over a forecast with light winds: the seas alone are enough.

The seas figure is the average height of the highest third of the waves, not the biggest wave. The weather service’s own example: with 10-foot seas, 1 wave in 10 will be larger than 11 feet, and 1 in 1,000 larger than 19 feet.

Why the bar and the forecast can disagree

They come from different agencies about different water. The advisory is the weather service’s forecast for up to 10 miles of open ocean. A bar restriction is the Coast Guard’s decision about the entrance itself, based on the wave height on the bar measured against a boat’s length and freeboard, and on the officer’s own knowledge of local conditions. A bar can be restricted with no advisory in force, and an advisory can be up while the bar has no restrictions.

Where the forecast comes from

The wind and seas on the tile are from the Medford office’s Coastal Waters Forecast, a text product written for each zone, shown period by period in the office’s own words. Advisories come from the weather service’s alerts for the two zones. If the board could not reach the alerts, the tile says “Advisories not checked”, which is not the same as no advisory. The Medford office’s recorded marine forecast is 541-776-4305.

Sources