Freshwater and Harbord Surf Stats

The figure shows the range of swells directed at Freshwater and Harbord over a normal August and is based upon 3224 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Freshwater and Harbord. In this particular case the best grid node is 30 km away (19 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These occurred only 71% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In either graph, 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 biggest spokes, was E, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the W. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Freshwater and Harbord 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 diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Freshwater and Harbord, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical August, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Freshwater and Harbord run for about 5% of the time.

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