Short Sands Surf Stats

This picture shows the variation of swells directed at Short Sands through an average April. It is based on 3360 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 most applicable grid node based on what we know about Short Sands. In the case of Short Sands, the best grid node is 22 km away (14 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but 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 74% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was ENE, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the SW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Short Sands and away from the coast. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Short Sands, 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 April, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Short Sands run for about 26% of the time.

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