Miramar Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the range of swells directed at Miramar through an average May and is based upon 3414 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Miramar, and at Miramar the best grid node is 28 km away (17 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, 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 happened only 23% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SSE, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WNW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Miramar 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 graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Miramar, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical May, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Miramar run for about 77% of the time.

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