Avoca Point Surf Stats

The graph describes the variation of swells directed at Avoca Point through an average June, based on 3506 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Avoca Point. In the case of Avoca Point, the best grid node is 5 km away (3 miles). The rose diagram shows 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 occurred only 48% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates the highest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell occurs. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was ESE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Avoca Point and away from the coast. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Avoca Point, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical June, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Avoca Point run for about 52% of the time.

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