Skegness Surf Stats

The graph describes the range of swells directed at Skegness through a typical July. It is based on 3459 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coast so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Skegness. In this particular case the best grid node is 20 km away (12 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but 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 74% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red represents the highest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell happens. The diagram implies that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was NE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the SW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Skegness and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Skegness, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average July, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Skegness run for about 2.0% of the time.

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