Osaki Surf Stats

This picture describes the combination of swells directed at Osaki through a typical September and is based upon 2880 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Osaki, and at Osaki the best grid node is 33 km away (21 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without 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 occurred only 76% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red shows the highest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was S, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Osaki and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Osaki, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average September, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Osaki run for about 10% of the time.

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