Punta Rocas Surf Stats

The figure shows the combination of swells directed at Punta Rocas over a normal October and is based upon 3471 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Punta Rocas. In this particular case the best grid node is 26 km away (16 miles). The rose diagram shows 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 0% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red shows biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell was forecast. The diagram indicates that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SSW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the S. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Punta Rocas 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 surfable at Punta Rocas, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical October, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Punta Rocas run for about 100% of the time.

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