Peenie Wally Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the variation of swells directed at Peenie Wally over a normal August and is based upon 3224 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the coast so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Peenie Wally, and at Peenie Wally the best grid node is 34 km away (21 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These were forecast only 83% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red shows the largest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell occurs. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was E (which was the same as the most common wind direction). Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Peenie Wally and out to sea. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Peenie Wally, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical August, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Peenie Wally run for about 17% of the time.

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