Playa de San Xurxo Surf Stats

This picture shows the combination of swells directed at Playa de San Xurxo through an average September, based on 3360 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 optimum grid node based on what we know about Playa de San Xurxo. In this particular case the best grid node is 16 km away (10 miles). The rose diagram describes 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 13% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates the biggest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was WNW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the NE. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Playa de San Xurxo and out to sea. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Playa de San Xurxo, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical September, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Playa de San Xurxo run for about 87% of the time.

read more