Dawlish Warren Surf Stats

This chart shows the combination of swells directed at Dawlish Warren through an average October, based on 2976 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Dawlish Warren, and at Dawlish Warren the best grid node is 33 km away (21 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but 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 were forecast 48% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red shows biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SW (which was the same as the prevailing wind direction). Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Dawlish Warren and out to sea. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Dawlish Warren, 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 October, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Dawlish Warren run for about 7% of the time.

read more