Pointe des Trois Bassins Surf Stats

The rose diagram illustrates the combination of swells directed at Pointe des Trois Bassins through an average September and is based upon 3360 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the coastline so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Pointe des Trois Bassins. In this particular case the best grid node is 28 km away (17 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These were forecast only 100% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red shows largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was N, whereas the the most common wind blows from the ESE. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Pointe des Trois Bassins and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Pointe des Trois Bassins, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical September, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Pointe des Trois Bassins run for about 0% of the time.

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