Ninety Mile Beach Surf Stats

The graph illustrates the range of swells directed at Ninety Mile Beach over a normal December. It is based on 2953 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Ninety Mile Beach, and at Ninety Mile Beach the best grid node is 22 km away (14 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These were forecast only 4% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, 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 longest spokes, was SW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the SSW. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Ninety Mile Beach 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 graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Ninety Mile Beach, 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 December, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Ninety Mile Beach run for about 96% of the time.

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