Papeete Harbour Surf Stats

This picture describes the combination of swells directed at Papeete Harbour over a normal April and is based upon 2880 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 Papeete Harbour, and at Papeete Harbour the best grid node is 11 km away (7 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These occurred only 99% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red shows highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was NW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the ENE. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Papeete Harbour and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Papeete Harbour, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical April, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Papeete Harbour run for about 1.0% of the time.

read more