Eastern Tasmania Surf Forecast by Steve Shearer (issued Wed 31st May)

Forecast Summary (tl;dr)

• Moderate sized S groundswell Fri AM, easing with NW tending N/NE winds
• Smaller Sat with a S/SE change
• Another mod sized S groundswell Sun with light onshore winds
• Potential NE windswell Wed, sizey on Thurs 

Recap

Small, long period S swells to 1-2ft yesterday, with a slight increase to 2ft today under continuing W to NW winds, fresh and gusty at times.

This week and weekend (May 30 - Jun 4)

No great change to the current pattern with a large high sitting very far up (right up on the QLD/NSW border!) allowing free passage for cold fronts into the lower Tasman and a generally synoptic W’ly flow to continue across the region, strengthened by fronts. Mostly long period S swell trains will continue to the be the dominant swell source until next week when a much more S’ly located high brings an onshore flow to most of the Eastern Seaboard.

Not much on offer Thurs apart from a few tiny S swell trains at S facing beaches, less than 2ft.

Friday still looks great as a stronger and broader system than today’s pushes past us on Thursday. A powerful fetch of gale to severe-gale W/SW-SW winds should produce a fun S’ly groundswell Friday to 3ft on the south magnets in the morning, easing back through the day. Conditions will be great for the south magnets again with winds from the north-western quadrant, but get in early for the size.

Another powerful front with gales to severe gales pushes NE into the Tasman Sat into Sun with a strong pulse of S swell making landfall across NETas at S facing beaches on Sun in the 3-4ft range. Winds look a little iffy with a high well to the SE bringing an onshore flow but winds should stay light enough for surface conditions to be reasonable.

Source of S swell for Sun

That pulse then eases back quickly Mon with some leftover S swell to 2ft under a light onshore flow.

As the high drifts E we should see a NE fetch develop off the South Coast down to Bass Strait likely Wed with a building NE windswell to 2-3ft during the day under freshening N-NNE winds.

The fetch strengthens overnight and into Thurs as a mid-latitude low approaches, likely seeing NE windswell build further to 3-5ft during the day.

Fri morning should see winds tend NW offering a great window of clean conditions before the size drops too much.

More NE windswell is possible later next weekend.

We’ll see how that looks when we come back Fri. Seeya then.