Bovisand Bay Surf Stats

This picture describes the combination of swells directed at Bovisand Bay through a typical September and is based upon 3360 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Bovisand Bay. In the case of Bovisand Bay, the best grid node is 36 km away (22 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing without direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These happened 31% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In each 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 biggest spokes, was WSW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the W. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Bovisand Bay and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Bovisand Bay, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average September, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Bovisand Bay run for about 34% of the time.

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