We studied the wave characteristics during the very severe cyclonic storm THANE which crossed the east coast of India between Puducherry and Cuddalore based on waves measured at a location in Bay of Bengal at 14 m water depth. Objective of the paper is to document the highest wave height measured in the nearshore waters of east coast of India. On 29 December 2011, cyclone passed within 77–315 km of the wave measurement location with maximum wind speed of 46.3 m/s (90 knots) and resulted in maximum wave height of 8.1 m. Maximum wave height recorded is 0.54 times the water depth, and the ratio of crest height to wave height of the highest wave recorded is 0.65. Maximum value of significant wave height estimated using the parametric wave model for deep-water conditions is 6.4 m, whereas the measured value is 6 m indicating that parametric wave model estimates the wave height reasonably well (within 8 % error) during the cyclone period.