Praia de Mira Surf Stats

The figure describes the variation of swells directed at Praia de Mira over a normal November, based on 3347 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Praia de Mira, and at Praia de Mira the best grid node is 17 km away (11 miles). The rose diagram shows 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 were forecast only 4% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red represents highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the largest spokes, was WNW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Praia de Mira 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 clean enough to surf at Praia de Mira, 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 surfable waves at Praia de Mira run for about 96% of the time.

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