Ala Moana Surf Stats

The rose diagram illustrates the variation of swells directed at Ala Moana over a normal May, based on 3440 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Ala Moana. In the case of Ala Moana, the best grid node is 39 km away (24 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These happened only 0% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell happens. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SSW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the S. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Ala Moana and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Ala Moana, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical May, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Ala Moana run for about 100% of the time.

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