Chapel Porth Surf Stats

This picture illustrates the combination of swells directed at Chapel Porth through a typical January, based on 3364 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Chapel Porth. In the case of Chapel Porth, the best grid node is 29 km away (18 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, 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 happened only 6% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red shows largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was W, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Chapel Porth and away from the coast. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Chapel Porth, 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 January, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Chapel Porth run for about 84% of the time.

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