Very inconsistent weekend swell, larger late next week
South Australian Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Friday 21st June)
Best Days: South Coast Sunday and Monday morning, later next week
Recap
Pumping waves across the South Coast all day yesterday with good easing sets from 3ft off Middleton, back to 2-3ft into the afternoon with all day offshores. Today was clean again and back to 2ft, while the Mid Coast was around 1-1.5ft yesterday, real tiny today.
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This weekend and next week (Jun 22 - 28)
Tomorrow will start tiny, but into the afternoon our new very inconsistent long-range SW groundswell should start to build.
This swell has hit Western Australia today and we'll see it arriving later tomorrow, even though the wave buoys might pick up the long-period fore-runners this evening.
We're expecting sets to build to a very infrequent 2-3ft off Middleton later tomorrow and peak around 3ft on Sunday, while every 15-20 minutes there may be bigger bomb sets to 4ft. The Mid Coast only looks to offer a tiny 1ft wave.
Conditions will be clean tomorrow morning, but bumpy with an E'ly wind into the afternoon.
A morning NE to possibly N/NE breeze is due on Sunday morning creating clean conditions across spots that like this wind, with E/NE winds into the afternoon.
The straightest surf is expected on Monday as the groundswell starts easing from a small 2ft off Middleton with a moderate to fresh N/NE tending N/NW breeze.
As touched on in Wednesday's update a large blocking high will deflect any swell generating fronts away from us through the weekend and into next week, resulting in a tiny run of swell with N'ly winds on the coast.
Come later in the week though we're due to see a large long-period W/SW groundswell filling across the state, generated by a significant storm in the southern Indian Ocean.
An initial pre-frontal fetch of W/NW gales will produce a small pulse of W/SW groundswell for Thursday, but of greater significance is a vast fetch of severe-gale W/SW winds setting in motion an active sea state for a stronger fetch of storm-force W/SW winds to move over, projecting through our western swell window.
A large, long-period and inconsistent W/SW groundswell will be seen off this source, arriving Friday and peaking to 3ft on the Mid Coast with 4ft sets more than likely, though long-period swells sometimes don't perform as well due to bottom friction.
Middleton should see inconsistent 4-5ft sets likely from Day St/Cliffs towards Goolwa. Winds look favourable and out of the N/NE all day Friday, creating bumpy conditions on the Mid Coast but we'll review this Monday. Have a great weekend!
Comments
Mid looking juicy Friday morning. Cross offshore wind and 4ft sets Yew
Ha, don't get too excited just yet, I've gone mostly 3ft (possibly bigger). Long period swells don't go to amazing on the Mid. Low expectations at this stage and be surprised.
The models almost always change with more than a week out. Now its showing that Fri arvo/Sat morn is biggest.
Why don’t long period swells go to great on the mid Craig?
Bottom friction. The greater the swell period the deeper the swell feels, and hence there is some loss due to bottom friction through Investigator Strait. And with any loss in size, this is a decent impact on a coast that mainly varies between 1-3ft. Mid-period swells don't 'feel' as deep and hence bottom direction is less of a factor.
“and peak around 3ft on Sunday, while every 15-20 minutes there may be bigger bomb sets to 3ft.”
Hey Craig, is that meant to be 4ft sets at the end of that sentence?
Ah yes, thanks.
Always low expectations
The best mind set! Works a treat when you're pleasantly surprised.
I know it's not very big yada yada, but I'm still surprised there's no-one out at Trigs this afternoon.
