Keawaiki Bay Surf Stats

This image illustrates the variation of swells directed at Keawaiki Bay through an average May and is based upon 3440 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the coast so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Keawaiki Bay. In this particular case the best grid node is 15 km away (9 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These happened only 93% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red shows the largest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell was forecast. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was W, whereas the the most common wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Keawaiki Bay 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 graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Keawaiki Bay, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical May, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Keawaiki Bay run for about 1.0% of the time.

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