Statistiques de Surf de Waimanu Bay

The figure illustrates the variation of swells directed at Waimanu Bay through an average June. It is based on 3384 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Waimanu Bay. In this particular case the best grid node is 41 km away (25 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 illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These happened only 13% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was ENE, whereas the the most common wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Waimanu Bay and offshore. We combine 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 good for surfing at Waimanu Bay, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical June, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Waimanu Bay run for about 87% of the time.

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