Praia do Rincao Surf Stats

The figure shows the variation of swells directed at Praia do Rincao through an average February. It is based on 3120 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Praia do Rincao, and at Praia do Rincao the best grid node is 46 km away (29 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, 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 were forecast only 58% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red represents biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell occurs. The diagram suggests that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SSE, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the ENE. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Praia do Rincao 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 clean enough to surf at Praia do Rincao, 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 February, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Praia do Rincao run for about 42% of the time.

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