Eastern Tasmania Surf Forecast by Steve Shearer (issued Fri Jan 19th)

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Late kick in new S swell Fri
• Fun S swell Sat
• Small pulses of inconsistent E/NE swell Sun, persisting Mon/Tues
• Spike in S swell later Sun, peaking Mon, easing Tues
• Possible new low approaching Tas next week with robust NE swell Wed then S swell, 

Recap

Offshore winds yesterday groomed NE windswell with size to 4ft in the morning, easing during the day . Today we have small S swell to 1-2ft at S exposed breaks with fresh SW tending S winds as a low south of the state skips away to the SE later today into tomorrow.

This weekend and next week (Jan19 - Jan26)

Not much change to the weekend f/cast. A compact low is tracking SE away from Tasmania with a nice slingshot fetch in the process of entering the Tasman adjacent to the Apple Isle. A retrograding fetch in the South Pacific is currently active and expected to send some fun surf our way over the weekend.

In the short run and plenty of S swell Sat morning in the 4ft range with easing winds, from the S/SE then tending E to NE by the a’noon. Expect an easing trend in S swell through the a’noon with some small E/NE swell filling in to 1-2ft.

Pre-frontal winds Sun blow W-NW with a  new high moving in from below the Island continent and an angled trough now looks like providing a much stronger S’ly flow into Sun, with the fetch extending along the South Coast into the lower Tasman (see below). A S’ly change from this system arrives Sun a’noon with E/NE swell to 2ft before that and a fast rising S swell to 2-3ft likely by the end of the day.

Source of S swell late Sun into Mon

Plenty of S swell into Mon with size to 4-5ft at S exposed breaks and fresh S’ly winds, easing during the day and tending SE. E/NE swell to 2 occ. 3ft will be in the mix as well during Mon, easing during Tues.

S swell eases right back on Tues with sets to 2ft easing during the day under light winds.

NE winds feeding into a trough or potential low look likely to generate another round of punch NE swell Wed with size up to 3-4ft under fresh NE winds.

Source of NE windswell Wed

Looking into mid week and all eyes on the Coral Sea where a tropical cyclone is expected to be resident. Uncertainty over track remains high with GFS favouring a slide down the sub-tropical ridge to the SE while EC is favouring a coastal crossing on the NQLD coast. Neither of those outcomes are favourable for swell production for Tasmania so only small amounts of E/NE swell are likely (if anything into next weekend).

More likely is a swell from the Southern quadrant as a front pushes under Tasmania later next week. 

Under current modelling that looks to supply some small S swell pulses Fri into next weekend. 

Low confidence of course due to the cyclone so expect revisions on Mon- hopefully upwards.

Until then, have a great weekend!