Eastern Tasmania Surf Forecast by Steve Shearer (issued Wed 30th Aug)

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Small mixed bag Thurs, late kick in S swell possible
• Plenty of short range S swell Fri
• Easing S swell Sat
• Small E/SE swell Sun
• Building NE windswell  Mon/Tues
• Small E swell in the mix Mon/Tues
• More S swell later next week

Recap

NE swells have continued with yesterday seeing surf in the 2-3ft range, easing a notch today with 2ft surf. Conditions were clean early under NW winds, before a S’ly change mid-morning now swinging SW again.

This week and next (Aug 30 - Sep8)

There’s a troughy pattern in play at present, with a long trough snaking from inland QLD down to the Central/Southern NSW Coast. Return flow off the back of a retreating high is feeding N’ly winds into the trough line. We’re expecting a front to interact with the trough overnight Thurs to form a low pressure trough in the Tasman. This trough then absorbs another trough of low pressure moving south from the South Pacific islands to form a large area of low pressure near New Zealand. Compared to Mondays notes the components of this complex pattern all look a little weaker and more mobile with reduced swell generating potential, but we will still see some useful pulses from the various incarnations of the broad pattern.

In the short run we’ll see mod/fresh W/NW winds tomorrow, shifting W/SW to SW as a strong front passes over the Island. Not much surf expected, just tiny leftovers likely blown flat through the day. A very late kick in S swell is possible, but Fri is a better bet.

Friday is a different story with the front sweeping up past the state bringing S swell to 3ft at S facing beaches with mod/fresh SW to S winds, likely easing later in the day as pressure gradients ease.

Through the weekend we’ll see winds ease as the front and subsequent low pressure trough in the Tasman move away. Light winds and easing S swell Sat should see a few workable 2ft waves at S facing beaches.

Winds from the bottom of the low pressure trough aren’t perfectly aligned for Tasmania but they should supply some small E/SE swell to 2ft on Sunday with continuing light winds tending N’ly and freshening in the a’noon.

Those winds look to generate another round of NE windswell for Mon, potentially up into the 2-3ft range, mixed in with some 2ft surf from the E, as the low hovers near NZ and sends a fetch out of Cook Strait. Fresh N’ly winds are expected Mon.

Similar mix of NE and E swells Tues, possibly a notch bigger in the 3ft range as the N’ly fetch strengthens before being shunted away by an approaching front. Pencil it in as winds turn offshores.

Looks like a small mixed bag for the rest of the week with an approaching frontal system Thurs possibly seeing a small S swell pulse Fri.

We’ll see how that looks on Fri.

Seeya then.