Chacopata Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the range of swells directed at Chacopata through a typical April, based on 3360 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 optimum grid node based on what we know about Chacopata. In the case of Chacopata, the best grid node is 41 km away (25 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These happened only 8% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell occurs. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NE, whereas the the most common wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Chacopata and offshore. 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 graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at Chacopata, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average April, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at Chacopata run for about 92% of the time.

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