South Australian Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Friday January 19th)

Best Days: Tomorrow morning South Coast, Tuesday South Coast for the keen

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Rapidly easing S'ly swell tomorrow with early N'ly winds, freshening from the NW ahead of an early PM, strong S/SW change
• Fresh S winds Sun
• Small background S/SW swell Mon and Tue, fading Wed
• Moderate E/SE-E tending fresh S/SE winds Mon, N/NE tending W/NW winds Tue
• Tiny Wed with W/NW tending SW wins
• Moderate sized mid-period W/SW swell for later Thu, peaking Fri with SW winds (possibly variable early)

Recap

A strong pulse of S'ly swell filled in yesterday across the South Coast and winds were cross-onshore but light early in the day, creating workable options before deteriorating through the day as winds shifted more south. The Mid Coast was tiny and windswelly, choppy into the afternoon.

Today conditions are cleaner down South with reinforcing S'ly energy maintaining less consistent 4-5ft sets while the Mid is also clean but a tease and only to 1ft.

Solid clean-ups this morning

This weekend and next week (20 - 26)

Make the most of today's and tomorrow's waves as the outlook for the rest of the period is average.

The stalling mid-latitude low responsible for yesterday's and today's S'ly swell has now cleared east across Tasmania, cutting off the swell generating S'ly winds in our swell window and with this we'll see a steady decline in surf through tomorrow.

At dawn 3ft+ sets are due across Middleton, dropping back to 2ft into the afternoon with tiny to flat surf in the gulf.

Winds look great and variable offshore early tomorrow, N/NW some spots and N/NE others, strengthening from the NW during the morning ahead of a trough and gusty S/SW change early afternoon. So surf before lunch.

Sunday will be a write-off with small surf and fresh S-S/SE winds in the wake of tomorrow's change.

A slow improvement in conditions is due into next week with winds shifting E/SE-E on Monday but swell wise, only small levels of background mid-period S/SW swell are due from a weak frontal system that's currently south of the country.

2ft waves are due across Middleton both Monday and Tuesday, with Tuesday morning being the best under a freshening N/NE offshore that may shift W/NW into the afternoon ahead of an approaching mid-latitude frontal system.

This mid-latitude front looks quite healthy, though ECMWF has this system stronger than GFS at the moment and expect some movement thanks to the uncertainty to the north-east of the country revolving around a forecast tropical cyclone.

We should see a fresh to possibly gale-force W/SW fetch generating a moderate sized W/SW swell for later Thursday but more so Friday.

Surf to 4ft or so is due across Middleton, 2ft on the Mid Coast but a secondary frontal system moving in Friday may bring onshore SW winds, spoiling the swell with an outside chance of early local offshore breezes.

This is a long way away though so check back Monday for the latest and discussion on a possible stronger follow up system. Have a great weekend!