Sandy Beach Surf Stats

This picture illustrates the variation of swells directed at Sandy Beach over a normal September. It is based on 3360 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 most applicable grid node based on what we know about Sandy Beach. In the case of Sandy Beach, the best grid node is 30 km away (19 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These were forecast only 51% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell happens. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was E (which was the same as the most common wind direction). Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Sandy Beach and out to sea. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Sandy Beach, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical September, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Sandy Beach run for about 49% of the time.

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