Hawkes Point Surf Stats

The rose diagram illustrates the variation of swells directed at Hawkes Point through a typical December, based on 3448 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Hawkes Point. In the case of Hawkes Point, the best grid node is 33 km away (21 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These happened only 9% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates the largest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell was forecast. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was W, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Hawkes Point and offshore. 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 clean enough to surf at Hawkes Point, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average December, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Hawkes Point run for about 80% of the time.

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