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Surf Height
Surf reports, forecasts and coastal weather that turn ocean model data into conditions you can read at a glance.
- role
- Design and engineering
- type
- Web app
- stack
- Python, PHP, JavaScript
problem
Surf forecasts start as global ocean and weather models: wave height and period far offshore, on a grid, every few hours. That isn't what breaks at your beach, and it isn't something you can read before work.
approach
- data
- A Python pipeline pulls NOAA's GFS wave and weather models, a NASA tide model, and live NDBC buoys and stations.
- nearshore
- Offshore swell is converted to breaking height at each beach, accounting for refraction as the waves reach the shore.
- ratings
- A tested rating function combines height, period and wind direction relative to the beach into stars and plain words: Good, Fair or Poor, with offshore, cross-shore or onshore wind.
- one source
- The same forecast pipeline feeds the pages and a JSON API, so the wave math lives in one place. New data goes live only after it validates; otherwise the last good forecast stays up.
result
115 spots with 7-day forecasts, current conditions, tides, sun times and wetsuit advice, from Ponte Vedra to Mavericks. Forecasts regenerate every day, and buoy and station observations update every hour.