Magic Lands Surf Stats

The figure describes the range of swells directed at Magic Lands over a normal April and is based upon 3360 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Magic Lands. In the case of Magic Lands, the best grid node is 31 km away (19 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These were forecast only 15% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red shows the highest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SW, 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 Magic Lands and away from the coast. We lump these in 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 Magic Lands, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical April, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Magic Lands run for about 11% of the time.

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