Tasman Low from 29 April
Favourite time of year!!
Yeah, I really like this one bastardos. Monday looks very special right now!
Shhhhhh, don't tell everyone Ben!!!!
Holy screaming hell bastardos. I see what you mean, east, nor east, east, east and east south east, with what looks like light offshores on Monday. South swell may not eventuate on current charts but that may change.
You're right about autumn being average so far, but this may change your opinion. It looks, well, scary. My mind is boggled.
And another look at some other charts and I can see where the southerly swell will come from.
Certainly some energy in the Tasman over the next week, and maybe more.
I wouldn't call it a Tasman low though.
It's a tropical low.(that may or may not undergo some ETT).
The deep trough/low near the North Island is the more impressive feature I reckon.
Looks to me like a low over NZ north island joining up with a coral sea low to create a mid seas low of some proportions.
Where is the line between the Tasman and the Coral Seas SS?
Well I think a Tasman low has to undergo a certain evolution.....IE usually spawned by some cold outbreak coming from the SW.....
This is neither. The trough is broadly tropical in origin and so is the CS low.
Just sayin....
The first trough that is currently siting just west of NZ was the product of cold air from the SW and a surface trough slipping down from the Coral Sea.
This low will be the product of the already established trough and another deeper trough moving down from the Coral Sea again.
I'm calling it a Tasman Low as it is in the Tasman Sea while doing most of its swell production.
But one could argue for hours on the classification.
True dat Craig but if a TC went ET as it passed through the Tasman would you call it a Tasman low?
I called it a tasman low because thats where it will be when the mercury begins to plummet, but i understand its not forming like a normal one - more in common with a cyclone drifting south.
Once this thing starts to form we are going to need some detailed comparisons with legendary swell production machines of years past. Crank up the froth-meter fellas, its gonna pump!!
No I wouldn't Steve, but this isn't a TC, haha
And by mercury you mean pressure Bastardos?
I can't think of any immediate comparisons from past years.
The Anzac Day swell of '09 was a semi-stationary ECL/Tasman low.
The july 2001 swell was a tropical low which drifted S from Vanautu.
This one is a classic North Island swell.
Gotta love that direction.
North Island swell with a tropical chaser.
So you seem way more excited by the current trough/high pressure cradle west of NZ than the upcoming Tasman/Coral Sea low over the weekend Steve? For me, I'm way more excited about the Tasman/Coral Sea low as it'll provide much much more favourable local synoptic winds, thus opening up a myriad of surfing options as opposed to the impending trough/high cradle which has strong S/SE winds to boot, hence squeezing every man and his camel into the already crowded points.
I doubt there'll be too many people surfing where I'll be Don.......it might be a bit windy but it should be solid....
The next swell is just icing on the cake. I'm just a bit concerned about the speed at which it tracks through the CS/Tasman..
Could you be possibly taking a trip up and out this way Steve? Swell and wind looks good from Sunday through to Tuesday.
Nah, I'm gunna keep it local Fitz.
There'll be plenty of waves around here.
I note that EC has continuously been progging the Tasman low to be much closer to the east coast than GFS come Sunday, so this could certainly assist with wave heights down south but dampen our spirits up here in SE Qld :(
Geeez, I hope that prog is a little inacurate for up here Don. But in saying that, out here I tend to get considerable more swell than what ends up on the coast. Also hoping the winds are going to be light. Its been blowing its tits off for days here. Either way, I hope everyone scores a little something nice.
Bugger me, I so hope the 18z GFS run is way off the mark!!!
Didn't see the 1800 run DonW, so not sure what you are seeing, but by god the latest 00 run has it just creating something significant.
It seems to be lining up perfectly for some outrageous wave heights, and somewhere in that mix may be some lighter offshore winds, but maybe SE qld won't be as clean as Sydney, mid-NSW coast.
I'm with bastardos, this looks like something for the annals and comparing old storm systems. That may depend on how far off the coast it is, as mentioned there is some conjecture there, but at least one has it getting serious at just far enough off the coast to let it organise into a swell, but close enough to get pretty much all of the energy. It looks freaking monstrous and working on an already existing fetch adds a degree of uncertainty in my mind about just how big it will be.
I'll be doing plenty of hindcasting on this one, if only for the history. As I've said elsewhere, this will be way outside my comfort one, except when I'm watching it from the cliffs.
18z had the North Island cutting the fetch in half with us only seeing a fleeting pulse of E'ly swell to 4-5ft or so.
Every other model was consistent in positioning the low smack bang within our swell window though so I wasn't worried.
Exciting forecast day tomorrow!!
Looking much more significant now.
ECMWF has the low stalled in the mid tasman for 3 days from Mon to Wed next week. Even more impressive is that a sub 995 low will will be pushing up against a 1030 high. This is a big system with a huge pressure differential covering a wide area of our swell window - with an already active sea-state!!
The Girls better be waxing up the bigger boards because when Laynes comp comes to town, DY point is gonna be pumping!
How do east swells go there?
I thought anything from S-SE is best as it hits first rock and then runs into suck, but with an E swell it may close out this section? I guess they can backdoor suck! Can't wait to see how they go!
Well it's certainly a dissappointment this morning, so let's hope either this swell (today) is running behind schedule, or next week's swell certainly makes up for the dissappointment this morning.
Looking much more significant now.
By: "freeride76"
Doesn't look to be any real different to me from the forecasts I was looking at a few days ago Steve? (particularly EC forecasts a few days ago).
Layne's comp starts on 3rd May and the swell should definitely have some SE in by then - perfect for the point. Given the performances we have been seeing from the girls lately, I will definitely be taking my daughters down to see Tyler Wright et al out the point.
E swells are a sketchier proposition than S - SE as the swell wont roll down the point at the same angle. The take off is outside of suck rather than up at first rock. If the sand is in place, the E swells are more likely to link up with the surfclub bank.
Look at the wave buoy go!!
3 metres at 13 seconds. Go little fella, keep climbing!
Surfed Queensie at lunchtime and it was clean as, 4ftish with some bigger ones coming thru. Then had a few at bower. Was driving home along beachfront on dark and..... what.....a......sight!! The swell has got a couple of extra feet and you could see a step up in energy and strength. Queensie bombie was top to bottom barrelling and the beachie was heavy. The blokes out were charging, hard, and the beachfront was lined with people watching. Traffic was crawling with people in the cars craning their necks to see wtf was going on in the ocean. Awesome sight, real buzz around, can't wait to see what the morn brings
Fark, I almost drowned today at Lennox.....got about 10 10-12ft waves on the head on the back peak.
Gnarliest hold downs since Haliewa.
It was serious out there.
Is this swell going to hang around??
Sydney buoy looks to have just peaked so we can expect a steady drop now into tomorrow.
Should still be some good size during the morning though!
Got some great shots from Queensie!!
We must've been following each other about Two Dogs. I surfed North Steyne/Queensy then went to the Bower then spent the arvo out the Bomby. Queensy was off the hook in the arvo but I had my heart set on the bomby. Ended up just getting flogged out there.
Fark, I almost drowned today at Lennox.....got about 10 10-12ft waves on the head on the back peak.
Gnarliest hold downs since Haliewa.
It was serious out there.
By: "freeride76"
Sounds heavy Steve. Was that the icing on the cake? ;)
Also Steve, after just reading your forecast that you produced on Monday, I read with interest the following comment:
The faster than expected southwards track enabled the new fetch to work on an already highly agitated sea-state enabling the rapid transfer of wind energy into groundswell as it propagated away from the source wind-field.
I was wondering if you could explain this a little further as I'm a little confused by it. The fetch that created the peak in swell early on in the weekend (Saturday 30th May)was actually created just off the west coast of New Zealand around Cook Strait latitudes on last Wednesday 27th April, however the fetch that created the monster swell on Monday 2nd May was created to the NW of NZ's north island on late Saturday 30th April/early Sunday 1st May. So apart from the two fetch locations being some distance away from each other, the actual timing of the peak fetches was some 3-4 days later, hence I'm wondering if you could explain further how the second fetch worked on an already highly agitated sea-state?
If you look at the ASCAT record you can clearly see the fetch that resided to the NW of the North Island maintained at least low end gales until the new low moved into that area.
So they weren't separate phenomena. And the tropical low moved into an already highly active sea state.
Yeah, as Steve said.
Even though winds eased west of New Zealand during Friday and Saturday, a broad fetch of 20-30kt E'ly winds were still maintained right until the low intensified and kicked into gear properly on Sunday morning.
Dunno if you saw my photos from Manly Don in the sessions 'Focal Point' but it was macking, and holding it!!
Thanks Steve and Craig. That makes a little more sense now as I was interpreting the comments as the second low was acting on the sea state from the first Tasman low earlier in the week, but in actual fact you were referring to the sea state on the northern flank of the Tasman high over Friday/Saturday.
And yeah Craig I checked out your pics. Nice. Don't get me wrong, I'm not questioning the size of the swell from this system at all. When I saw buoy readings jump on Monday and continue to rise into Monday afternoon (both swell and period) I figured we were witnessing a solid groundswell indeed.
well it wasn't quite a standard high flank....the trough was lingering in that area
As big as it was, did anyone else expect something bigger?
Not complaining, just observing, but I really thought that looked like a phenomenal set of events to line up such a swell.
Saying that, I am well aware that it probably peaked perfectly at midnight on Monday night.
Just wondering.
I was stunned at how big it did get. I mean this was fuckign seriously big and strong surf.
I expected peak in the 6ft+ range and got mowed by Hawaiian style juice in the 8-10ft range.
Models are lining up nicely for this one. Looks like a broad trough is moving down from the coral sea and will spin up in to a serious low around the end of this week. Bothe ECMWF and BOM are modelling that it will track south over the weekend, perfectly positioned for maximum swell producing for entire east coast. We will get it from all directions, ENE, E, SE and the S over the course of the swell.
Could actually get proper big.
The positioning and track of this system is reminiscent of April 2008 (i think it was 2008) when it pumped for weeks
The only worry is the local winds, might be a bit onshore at times - wait and see.
The very average autumn so far looks like its turning the corner and we should have a very active Tasman Sea in the weeks ahead.