Surf Forecast Surf Report
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Papa Tangaroa Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

The figure describes the range of swells directed at Papa Tangaroa through an average March. It is based on 2964 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Papa Tangaroa. In this particular case the best grid node is 22 km away (14 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without 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 12% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red illustrates highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell happens. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the ENE. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Papa Tangaroa and away from the coast. We group these 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 clean enough to surf at Papa Tangaroa, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical March, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Papa Tangaroa run for about 88% of the time.

Also see Papa Tangaroa wind stats

Compare Papa Tangaroa with another surf break

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