Sharks Point Surf Stats

The rose diagram shows the range of swells directed at Sharks Point through an average May and is based upon 3422 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Sharks Point. In the case of Sharks Point, the best grid node is 28 km away (17 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These occurred only 20% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red shows the biggest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell occurs. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was S, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the NW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Sharks Point and away from the coast. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Sharks Point, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical May, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Sharks Point run for about 80% of the time.

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