Fatuuli Rock Surf Stats

This picture shows the variation of swells directed at Fatuuli Rock through an average May and is based upon 2944 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the shore so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Fatuuli Rock. In the case of Fatuuli Rock, the best grid node is 31 km away (19 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These happened only 58% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SSW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Fatuuli Rock and out to sea. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Fatuuli Rock, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical May, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Fatuuli Rock run for about 42% of the time.

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