Observation of rogue wave triplets in water waves

Doubly-localised breather solutions of the nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLS) are considered to be appropriate models to describe rogue waves in water waves as well as in other nonlinear dispersive media such as fibre optics. Within the hierarchy of this type of formations, the Peregrine breather (PB) is the lowest-order rational solution. Higher-order solutions of this kind may be understood as a nonlinear superposition of fundamental Peregrine solutions. These superpositions are nontrivial and admit only a fixed well prescribed number of elementary breathers in each higher-order solution. Here, we report first observation of second-order solution which in reality is a triplet of rogue waves.