Vagabundo Surf Stats

The figure illustrates the combination of swells directed at Vagabundo through an average May, based on 3440 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the shore so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Vagabundo. In the case of Vagabundo, the best grid node is 41 km away (25 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, 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 were forecast only 5% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red illustrates the 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 prevailing swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NNW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Vagabundo 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 graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Vagabundo, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical May, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Vagabundo run for about 95% of the time.

read more