Eastern Tasmania Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 21st October)

Best Days: No great days due to small surf, or very wind affected conditions. But.. most of next week looks very promising for plenty of surf. Just gotta nail the favourable wind pockets. 

Recap: Persistent small surf. 

This week (Oct 22 - 23)

*This week’s Forecaster Notes will be a little erratic as Craig’s on annual leave*

The synoptics are dominated by a complex pattern of low pressure troughs from the Tasman Sea all the way across the eastern states and out into South Australia.

This is expected to produce a dynamic period of weather for much of the eastern states - including some rain for northern and eastern Tasmania - though initially not a lot of swell. 

First up, we’ve still got the potential for small long period S’ly swells to grace the coastline over the coming days. The WA, SA, Vic and Tasmania buoys have all picked up peak periods around the 20 second mark over the last few days, though this was from a swell that was aimed well and truly outside of our swell window (and is traversing the Tasman Sea through to the South Pacific right now). I’m not expecting much from it here.

A second, similarly long period groundswell is due to reach Western Tasmania overnight and it has a little more potential for Eastern Tasmania, though it’s still a very flukey, low percentage event. Keep your eyes out for anything of interest at the reliable south swell magnets, but I doubt we’ll pick up any noteworthy surf. 

Overall, keep your expectations low - there’s really not much surf on the way. 

This weekend (Oct 24 - 25)

As the inland trough moves east, we’ll see freshening N/NE winds across Southern NSW on Friday and Saturday, that will generate a small NE swell for Eastern Tasmania this weekend. However the fetch won’t be terribly strong and won’t last long either, so I’m not expecting much size (maybe some 1-2ft sets later Saturday and into Sunday). 

The backside of the trough’s passage will be a much more dynamic swell generator for us. 

Strong to gale force S/SE winds will develop in the lower Tasman Sea on Saturday, extending further east to cover most of the water through to New Zealand into Sunday. However the tail end of the fetch will be at about Tasmanian latitudes which means most of the swell generated will be aimed up into NSW. 



Fortunately, an unrelated polar low moving up from the south will generate building southerly swells, from as early as late Saturday onwards, though Sunday is a safer bet.

The issue on Sunday is that we’ll see strong S/SE winds accompanying this building trend so most locations will be a write-off. South facing beaches should pick up 3-5ft sets (being a combo of S’ly groundswell and SE windswell) but sheltered spots will be a lot smaller. 

So, there’ll be waves this weekend - but keep your expectations low as quality will be in very short supply. 

Next week (Oct 26 onwards)

Next week’s outlook is very tricky though quite promising. 

The Tasman trough responsible for Sunday’s windy conditions looks to stall near the lower Mid North NSW Coast which means much of Southern NSW and Eastern Tasmania may remain entrenched in a gusty SE tending E/SE airstream. This may persist for a few days too, and will generate plenty of E’ly swell for our region.

However, there’s presently no indication as to when the onshore breeze will let up.

Long range models are holding this pattern almost stationary until the end of the week, so it looks like we could be looking at an extended period of strong surf throughout the region. It’s too early to pin down size estimates, and more importantly, pockets of favourable winds (though at this stage, the end of next week looks much more promising than the start). I’ll have more details in Friday’s update. 

See you then!