Right Point • Statistics for February

February: The Deep Freeze Pulse

February serves up similar stats to January - 5.6ft (1.7m) average swell, 8.7s period - but with a subtle shift toward the good direction. The combined ENE-E-ESE-SE window actually expands to around 19% of wave energy, the best of deep winter, and there are more E/SE events linked to slow-moving coastal lows or nor'easters. Those are the days Right Point can be truly firing, especially when the low sits far enough south to aim a long easterly fetch into the coast. S and SSW swells still dominate the statistical rose, but they are less interesting for this setup.

The offshore wind signal remains strong - WSW-W-WNW-NW makes up 43% of all wind, led by WNW at 14.8% and NW at 12.2%. The bad onshore E/ESE/SE winds are still minor. This is one of the coldest months on the calendar: air averages -2.0°C, water temperature is a brutal 0.8°C, and precipitation is 3.20mm/day. The NAO is often the controlling factor; a negative NAO helps shunt low pressure into the western Atlantic, setting up repeated pulses of cold, offshore, pumping surf.