Faja Dos Padres Surf Stats

The figure describes the range of swells directed at Faja Dos Padres through an average July. It is based on 2976 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coast so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Faja Dos Padres. In the case of Faja Dos Padres, the best grid node is 17 km away (11 miles). The rose diagram describes 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 37% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red represents the highest 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 largest spokes, was NW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the NNE. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Faja Dos Padres 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 diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Faja Dos Padres, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical July, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Faja Dos Padres run for about 63% of the time.

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