South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast (issued Wednesday 23rd April)

South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 23rd April)

Best Days: No great days. Maybe a small trade swell for the beachies in SE Qld from late Thurs thru' the weekend but nothing great is likely just now. Tues: potentially strong south swell with freshening NW winds. Next Wed/Thurs/Fri: plenty of S'ly swell with W'ly tending SW winds. Also some trade swell in the mix.

Recap: Tiny conditions. 

This week (Apr 24-25)

Not much to finish the working week. Northern NSW will remain tiny on Thursday, and a small south swell will fill in throughout Friday, generated by a southerly change pushing up the southern NSW coast overnight on Thursday. No great size is expected though and only south swell magnets will pull in bumpy 2-3ft waves by the afternoon (probably smaller at dawn, especially north of Coffs) with unfavourable winds from the southern quarter. It’ll be clean but tiny in protected locations.

In SE Qld and across the Far North Coast, we’re looking at a small building east swell during this period, originating from a slight muscling up of the trades south of New Caledonia over the last day or so. No great size is expected however there’s no need to change the numbers from Monday’s estimates - we’re looking at 2ft+ sets across the Sunshine Coast by Friday (smaller Thursday), a little smaller on the Gold Coast and probably not much at all south of about Ballina. 

Winds in SE Qld should be light with sea breezes on Thursday, but the outlook is a little mixed across the models for Friday, as they’re not resolving the position of a northward advancing trough very well. As such the best line of fit right now is to expect a period of light winds early tending fresh SE throughout the day, however there is a chance of a lingering NW breeze early morning.

This weekend (Apr 26-27)

It’s not shaping up to be an overly memorable weekend of surf across the region. The small south swell expected to push along the coast on Friday afternoon should reach exposed south swell magnets of the Far North Coast and SE Qld on Saturday but there won’t be much size in it, just a couple of feet at best. 

This will mix in with a small trade swell of a similar size - the models have pulled back the strength of the trades later this week so I don’t think we’ll see any more size than what’s forecast on Friday (2ft+ tops across SE Qld, smaller south  of the border). Wind wise, we’re on track for an early light and variable  airstream and afternoon sea breezes (tending N’ly in the lower Mid North Coast).

Sunday looks like it’ll see small residual swells from both the south and east, with early NW winds ahead of a fresh S’ly change sweeping along the Northern NSW Coast during the day, probably reaching SE Qld in the afternoon. 

Next week (Apr 28 onwards)

Next week looks very interesting at this stage. First up, we’re not expecting any great swell from the eastern quadrant right now (the trades south of New Caledonia will remain anchored in place, but without any great strength) however a broadening high pressure system east of New Zealand may strengthen the ridge between it and a developing trough of low pressure in and around the eastern Fijian region, which may initially give rise to a slightly more prominent trade swell later next week. 

They’re also suggesting we may see a more focused system (trough/low) develop in the western part of this region early next week (south of Fiji), which if it eventuates could become a decent source of swell for the East Coast later next week or the following weekend - but this is still a very long time away so we’ll evaluate in more detail on Friday.

Of much greater interest is our southern swell window, which admittedly doesn’t necessarily hold much promise for SE Qld. Still, the charts are looking juicy and with enough forewarning there’s no reason not to be able to snaffle a day off work and plan a road trip south of the border.

Sunday’s slowly advancing southerly change along the Northern NSW Coast will be linked to a deep, intense low pressure system just to the S/SE of Tasmania on Saturday. Current model progs suggest this’ll be quite a beast of a weather system, located right on the western periphery of NSW’s acute south swell window; but the good news is that there’s a general agreement between the models for a N/NE track up into the southern Tasman Sea through the weekend.

This should generate a strong long period south swell that’s currently due to arrive in the Sydney region later Monday ahead of a peak early Tuesday. This should translate to a building trend across Northern NSW on Tuesday. At this stage the exact size and timing requires some elasticity however based on current guidance, I wouldn’t be surprised to see 4-6ft sets at a handful of reliable Northern NSW south swell magnets at the height of the swell on Tuesday (without much size getting in north of the border, unfortunately). Due to the acute southerly swell direction, it'll also be a lot smaller at protected locations.

The current wind outlook for Tuesday is for a freshening NW trend as another system approaches from the west. Let's see how Friday's model data is holding true with this outcome.

Easing southerly swells and gusty W’ly winds are then expected on Wednesday.

Looking further beyond this and another classic winter front/low is expected to cross the Tasmanian region later Tuesday and into Wednesday, which should give us another round of solid south swell for the Northern NSW Coast second half of the week, with moderate to fresh SW winds accompanying. We’ll take a closer look at the longer term outlook in Friday’s notes.