Kaaimans River Mouth Surf Stats

The rose diagram illustrates the range of swells directed at Kaaimans River Mouth over a normal July. It is based on 3720 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coast so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Kaaimans River Mouth. In the case of Kaaimans River Mouth, the best grid node is 56 km away (35 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, 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 3% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell occurs. The diagram suggests that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SSW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the W. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Kaaimans River Mouth and offshore. We lump these in 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 Kaaimans River Mouth, 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 July, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Kaaimans River Mouth run for about 97% of the time.

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