South Australian Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday 17th January)

Best Days: South Coast Thursday and Friday morning at magnets

Recap

Flat on the Mid yesterday morning, increasing slightly into the afternoon and coming in at 0.5-1ft today with light offshore winds.

The South Coast saw a mix of S/SE windswell and slowly building long-period SW groundswell yesterday with workable E'ly winds, cleaner and improving this morning as the groundswell peaks to 3ft+ off Middleton with light offshore winds.

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This week and weekend (Jan 18 – 21)

Today's inconsistent SW groundswell will ease through tomorrow, further into Friday but with favourable winds.

We should see easing sets from 2-3ft across Middleton tomorrow morning under an early N/NE tending N/NW breeze, variable into the evening.

Friday will then be small with fading sets from 1-2ft off Middleton, best at Waits and Parsons with an early N'ly wind, giving into a S/SE change late morning. The Mid isn't expected to see any size with fading 0.5ft sets tomorrow.

The weekend is unfortunately looking poor with no decent swell for the Mid Coast and SE tending S/SE winds across the South Coast. We'll see some junky S/SE windswell building with these winds Saturday, reaching a sloppy 2-3ft Saturday afternoon, easing from a similar size Sunday morning.

Next week onwards (Jan 22 onwards)

A good SW groundswell is due to fill in Monday, generated by an elongated and persistent fetch of strong to gale-force W/SW winds traversing the polar shelf from the Heard Island region, to under the country over the weekend.

The swell should provide good 3ft+ sets across Middleton on Monday with 1ft+ sets on the Mid Coast though with persistent onshore S'ly winds.

The swell is expected to drop into Tuesday as S/SE winds persist. A secondary pulse of slightly more consistent and possibly larger SW swell is due Wednesday from a secondary more northerly placed frontal progression, but again with average winds for the South Coast. More on this Friday though.