Langs beach Surf Stats

The rose diagram shows the variation of swells directed at Langs beach through a typical June, based on 3506 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Langs beach. In the case of Langs beach, the best grid node is 40 km away (25 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks 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 only 39% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red illustrates 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 dominant swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NE, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Langs beach and offshore. 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 Langs beach, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average June, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Langs beach run for about 61% of the time.

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