Surf Forecast Surf Report
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Backwash Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

This image shows the combination of swells directed at Backwash over a normal March. It is based on 3460 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Backwash, and at Backwash the best grid node is 26 km away (16 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These happened only 0% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate 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 frequently that size swell occurs. The diagram suggests that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was SSW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the W. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Backwash and away from the coast. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Backwash, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical March, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Backwash run for about 27% of the time.

Also see Backwash wind stats

Compare Backwash with another surf break

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