Sandy Bay Surf Stats

This picture illustrates the variation of swells directed at Sandy Bay through a typical July. It is based on 3472 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 most applicable grid node based on what we know about Sandy Bay. In the case of Sandy Bay, the best grid node is 31 km away (19 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 illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These occurred only 1.5% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red represents largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell was forecast. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Sandy Bay and out to sea. We lump these in 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 surfable at Sandy Bay, 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 July, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Sandy Bay run for about 86% of the time.

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