Spirits Bay Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the variation of swells directed at Spirits Bay through a typical November. It is 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 most applicable grid node based on what we know about Spirits Bay, and at Spirits Bay the best grid node is 51 km away (32 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks 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 94% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell happens. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was N, whereas the the most common wind blows from the SW. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Spirits Bay and out to sea. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Spirits Bay, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average November, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Spirits Bay run for about 6% of the time.

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