South Australian Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 25th June)

Best Days: Tues/Wed/Thurs: easing at Victor, though clean with generally good winds (a little blustery Thurs). Wed: chance for a small pulse on the Mid, nothing great tho'. Sat/Sun: small surf on the Mid, bigger at Victor with periods of OK conditions.

Recap: There’s been plenty of fun surf across the Mid Coast for the last few days, both Saturday and Sunday saw clean though inconsistent 2ft+ surf, with size easing to 1-2ft this morning under a light offshore breeze. Saturday morning was very clean at Victor with light offshore winds, onshores developed Saturday afternoon before swinging E’ly for Sunday then tending variable into the afternoon, with strong swells pushing 4-5ft at Middleton. Size has eased slowly through today and conditions are much better with moderate offshore winds. 

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This week (Jun 26 - 29)

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Note: Today’s Forecaster Notes will be brief, as Craig is away on annual leave. Also, these Forecaster Notes will be updated Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays for the next few weeks.

We’ve got a relatively quiet week of surf ahead, as our swell windows have been inactive for the last few days. Light E’ly winds are possible down south Tuesday (though should be NE early) and Wednesday will remain light and variable, probably offshore. Today's easing swells will continue to abate into Tuesday and will become very small by the afternoon.

A small long period W/SW swell is expected to glance the coast around Wednesday, generated by a Southern Indian Ocean low over the weekend, though it wasn’t particularly strong so the resulting surf will be very small - with Victor’s prospects further compounded by the westerly swell direction. We may see small lines pulse across the Mid Coast during the day but I’d be surprised it we saw much more than a stray 1-1.5ft set every fifteen minutes. It'll be clean with light winds though, so ideal for beginners. 

Strengthening N/NW winds are then expected Thursday (with small persistent swells at Victor again) ahead of a SW change on Friday and a rise in swell from a few sources related to a developing cut-off low in the Bight. 

Unfortunately, this system has been downgraded over the last few model runs, though we’ll see a small increase in size across the Mid Coast throughout the day (building from 1-2ft to 2ft+). Moderate onshore winds will take the sheen off things. 

Victor will see more size but local conditions won’t be great under fresh onshore winds, so don’t get your hopes up for anything amazing to finish the week.

This weekend (June 30 - July 1)

A series of modest secondary fronts trailing behind the cut-off low will maintain small swells across the Mid Coast all weekend, generally in the 1-2ft range though there’s always the chance for a tidally induced push on the incoming movement north of 2ft+. Winds will hold light to moderate out of the SW on Saturday but should go variable for Sunday.

Unfortunately, though the synoptic chart looks pretty active from about Thursday onwards, there's no great consolidation between what's essentially an ad-hoc progression of surface lows and fronts. Based on current model guidance, this significantly downplays the prospects of quality swell generation.

These swells will be a little better positioned for Victor (than those over the preceding days), so we’re likely to see 2-3ft surf at Middleton early Saturday, building to 3ft+ into the afternoon and holding through Sunday. Conditions look tricky; early W/WW winds are likely early Saturday but will probably veer SW during the day, then variable conditions are expected Sunday so an improvement is likely as wave heights reach a maximum.

So overall, not too bad both days, on both coasts. Let’s fine tune Wednesday.  

Next week (July 2 onwards)

Easing swells early next week will precede an active Southern Ocean storm track that looks like generating a couple of solid swells for our coast mid-late next week and into the weekend. It’s still early days though so let’s take a closer look Wednesday.