James Kealoha Beach Park Surf Stats

The figure describes the variation of swells directed at James Kealoha Beach Park over a normal November, based on 3347 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about James Kealoha Beach Park. In the case of James Kealoha Beach Park, the best grid node is 29 km away (18 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These happened only 35% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from James Kealoha Beach Park and away from the coast. We group 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 James Kealoha Beach Park, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical November, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at James Kealoha Beach Park run for about 65% of the time.

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