Mangahume Surf Stats

This chart illustrates the variation of swells directed at Mangahume through an average June, based on 3266 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the coast so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Mangahume, and at Mangahume the best grid node is 37 km away (23 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These happened only 19% of the time. Green and yellow show 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 was forecast. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was WSW (which was the same as the most common wind direction). Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Mangahume and away from the coast. 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 surfable at Mangahume, you can view an alternative image that shows only the swells that were predicted to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical June, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Mangahume run for about 81% of the time.

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