The Pass Surf Stats

This image shows the range of swells directed at The Pass through a typical May and is based upon 3439 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about The Pass. In this particular case the best grid node is 29 km away (18 miles). The rose diagram illustrates 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 occurred 73% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates 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 most common swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SE, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the S. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from The Pass and offshore. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at The Pass, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average May, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at The Pass run for about 2.0% of the time.

read more