South Australian Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday 29th July)

Best Days: South Coast later morning tomorrow, similar Wednesday, Friday both coasts, Saturday and Sunday down South

Recap

Great waves all weekend down South with fun amounts of W/SW-SW groundswell between 2-3ft off Middleton and generally clean conditions. The Mid Coast hovered between 1-2ft all weekend, cleanest yesterday.

An onshore change moved through during the early hours of this morning, creating poor conditions down South, cleaner on the Mid but back to a tiny 1-1.5ft.

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This week and weekend (Jul 30 – Aug 4)

Today's onshore S/SE change was associated with a surface trough sliding in from the west, and we'll see it continuing to clear off to the east tomorrow, resulting in winds swinging back to the E/NE-NE down South tomorrow morning, E/NE on the Mid Coast. The early will likely be lumpy down South, with improving conditions through the mid-late morning.

A mix of long-range and inconsistent W/SW groundswell along with a small S'ly groundswell from a strong low that formed south-southwest of Tasmania last night is expected, though we'll generally see the surf hanging around 3ft off Middleton and 1ft+ on the Mid Coast. The models are incorrectly combining these swells and over-forecasting the size down South tomorrow and into Wednesday morning.

Winds on Wednesday look to play out similar to tomorrow with a morning NE offshore ahead of S/SE sea breezes and easing 2-3ft sets off Middleton, 1ft on the Mid.

A low point in swell is expected Thursday morning with unfavourable SE winds on the South Coast, but later in the day a new W/SW groundswell is due to start building, though Friday will reveal all the size.

Late last week we were looking at a very inconsistent long-range W/SW groundswell event, but we're now expected to see some closer-range developments which will provide more size and consistency and from a better angle for the South Coast.

A strong frontal progression has been moving through the southern Indian Ocean since late last week, generating an inconsistent and long-range W/SW groundswell, but the remnants of this progression will continue east-southeast over the coming days.

We'll see the progression re-strengthening south of the country, with a very impressive pre-frontal fetch of severe-gale W/NW winds followed by a post-frontal gale to severe-gale W'ly fetch south-west of us on Wednesday.

A moderate sized long-period W/SW groundswell is due to arrive Thursday afternoon, peaking Friday morning, with a SW component to the swell into the afternoon Friday.

Size wise, the Mid Coast will be on the tiny side and slow with inconsistent 1ft to maybe 2ft sets later Thursday and Friday, while Middleton should build to 2-3ft later Thursday and peak Friday to 3ft+.

Winds look OK for both coasts in the morning, with a variable breeze on the Mid Coast, and W/NW down South, shifting SW through the day.

Saturday looks similar though we'll likely see NW-W/NW winds persisting all day down South.

Sunday should be great with N/NW offshores and a new S/SW groundswell, generated by a late forming and strong polar storm south-west of Tassie on Friday. This was looking a little better for us (swell production wise) but now looks to only keep sets up around 3ft Sunday morning off Middleton before easing through the day.

Longer term there's a bit of mid-latitude storm activity on the cards for next week bringing plenty of wind and swell, but more on this in Wednesday's update.