South Australian Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 23rd February)

Best Days: Wed/Thurs/Fri: fun small waves on the Mid. 

Recap: A small long range groundswell provided fun waves at Victor yesterday and today with clean conditions. Surf size has been tiny on the Mid.   

Today’s Forecaster Notes are brought to you by Rip Curl

This weekend (Feb 24 - 25)

As luck would have it, both the the cut off low in the Bight (remnants of ex-TC Kelvin) and the unrelated approaching frontal system in the far south-western Bight will both display unfavourable synoptic setups for Mid Coast's swell potential. 

So, with developing onshore winds during the early hours of Saturday morning, we’re looking at small bumpy waves at Victor on Saturday, building into Sunday with a new S/SW swell from a southern front. Across the Mid, we’ll see tiny cross-shore conditions both days. 

Forget it!

Next week (Feb 26 onwards)

Sunday’s swell down south will ease rapidly through Monday, but winds will remain out of the SE so conditions won’t improve until Tuesday when we’re looking at light NE winds ahead of an approaching westerly change. 

Tuesday is therefore the pick of the short term period at Victor, though wave heights will be much smaller and best suited to exposed beaches. There’ll be very little swell across the Mid early next week, just some tiny long range residual energy from our far swell window.

Wednesday onwards looks much more promising. A polar front developing off the ice shelf (well SW of WA) this weekend will track NE towards the western Bight, reaching a position south of Albany around Monday night before the front weakens as it moves through the northern Bight. 

A gusty associated onshore change is expected overnight Tuesday and will ease rapidly through Wednesday before we see a period of light variable winds and sea breezes on Thursday and Friday.

Fortunately, the storm track looks OK for some small swell for the Mid, and a series of secondary systems travelling behind should maintain rideable waves right through the second half of the week. At this stage we’re looking at 2-3ft surf building through Wednesday afternoon (though possibly a little bumpy, dependent on how the post-frontal onshore lingers) with clean but inconsistent 2ft+ surf expected Thursday and Friday on the more favourable parts of the tide (expect periods of small surf on the outgoing phases). 

Victor looks average through this period, with a less favourable swell direction and onshore winds Wednesday likely become OK on Thursday and Friday - though size may be a little too big for Waits and Parsons, but also too small for anywhere close to Victor. 

See you Monday!