Faial Wind Stats

The graph illustrates how commonly and how strongly the wind blows from different directions through a typical April. The largest spokes point in the directions the wind most commonly blows from and the shade of blue implies the strength, with the strongest winds shown by deep blue. It is based on 2880 NWW3 forecasts of wind since since 2007, at 3hr intervals, for the closest NWW3 model node to Faial, located 27 km away (17 miles). There are insufficient recording stations world wide to use actual wind data. Without question some coastal places have very localized wind effects that would not be predicted by NWW3. According to the model, the dominant wind at Faial blows from the NNW. If the rose graph shows a fairly circular pattern, it means there is no strong bias in wind direction at Faial. By contrast, dominant spokes illustrate favoured directions, and the more deep blue, the stronger the wind. Spokes point in the direction the wind blows from. Over an average April, the model suggests that winds are light enough for the sea to be glassy (the lightest shade of blue) about 9% of the time (3 days each April) and blows offshore 25% of the time (6 days in an average April). In a typical April wind stronger than >40kph (25mph) was expected for only a single days at Faial

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