[The Electrician]

One way that rogue waves apparently form is when the strong currents meet winds and waves moving in the opposite direction . . . A particularly threatening spot, he said, turned out to be where big oil tankers coming from the Middle East ride the Agulhas current around South Africa. There, the westward-flowing current meets prevailing easterly winds, at times disastrously.

Something fishy is going on in the last sentence quoted above. Supposedly the rogue wave problem occurs when currents move in the opposite direction from winds. However, "prevailing easterly winds" blow from the East towards the West, while "westward-flowing current" also flows from the East towards the West. So, this would seem to be in contradiction of the earlier statement, since the Agulhas current seems to be flowing with the wind instead of opposite to the wind. But, then, this is the New York Times, so nothing that is printed there can be taken at face value...

[Clara Lou]

So, it seems that the writer doesn't know that "easterly" means "from the east" rather than "towards the east." I'm sure a lot of people aren't clear on that. One would expect more from someone who makes their living with words. Or maybe not, these days.