Holly Beach Surf Stats

The rose diagram illustrates the range of swells directed at Holly Beach through a typical April, based on 3358 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Holly Beach, and at Holly Beach the best grid node is 30 km away (19 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, 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 occurred 32% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates the largest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was SSE, whereas the the most common wind blows from the SE. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Holly Beach and out to sea. 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 clean enough to surf at Holly Beach, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average April, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Holly Beach run for about 68% of the time.

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