Longsands Bay Surf Stats

The figure describes the range of swells directed at Longsands Bay through a typical September and is based upon 2880 NWW3 model predictions since 2008 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Longsands Bay. In this particular case the best grid node is 27 km away (17 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 illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These occurred 56% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red illustrates highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell occurs. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was NNE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Longsands Bay and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Longsands Bay, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average September, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Longsands Bay run for about 14% of the time.

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