South Jetty and Dog Beach Surf Stats

The graph shows the combination of swells directed at South Jetty and Dog Beach through an average December and is based upon 3448 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coast so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about South Jetty and Dog Beach, and at South Jetty and Dog Beach the best grid node is 35 km away (22 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, 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 14% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red shows biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was WSW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the NNW. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from South Jetty and Dog Beach and offshore. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at South Jetty and Dog Beach, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical December, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at South Jetty and Dog Beach run for about 86% of the time.

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