St Georges de Didonne Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the variation of swells directed at St Georges de Didonne through an average April. It is 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 most applicable grid node based on what we know about St Georges de Didonne. In the case of St Georges de Didonne, the best grid node is 41 km away (25 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without 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 12% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red represents largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was W, whereas the the most common wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from St Georges de Didonne and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at St Georges de Didonne, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical April, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at St Georges de Didonne run for about 88% of the time.

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