Oualidia Surf Stats

The rose diagram describes the combination of swells directed at Oualidia through an average September, based on 2880 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 optimum grid node based on what we know about Oualidia. In the case of Oualidia, the best grid node is 28 km away (17 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These happened only 1.3% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and red shows highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how frequently that size swell happens. The diagram suggests that the most common swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NW, whereas the the dominant 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 Oualidia and out to sea. We lump these in 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 Oualidia, 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 September, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Oualidia run for about 19% of the time.

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