Parengarenga Harbour Bar Surf Stats

The graph describes the range of swells directed at Parengarenga Harbour Bar through a typical October. It is based on 2976 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Parengarenga Harbour Bar. In this particular case the best grid node is 4 km away (2 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These were forecast only 96% of the time. Green and yellow show 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 frequently that size swell was forecast. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was ENE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Parengarenga Harbour Bar and offshore. We group these 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 Parengarenga Harbour Bar, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average October, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Parengarenga Harbour Bar run for about 4% of the time.

read more