South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 19th January)

Best Days: Very good waves Thurs/Fri/Sat with a moderate E'ly swell and early light winds. 

Recap: Very small waves over the weekend, nothing to write home about. A small southerly groundswell is pushing along the Northern NSW coast today, but early W/SW winds are now fresh S’ly in the Far North and SE across the Mid North Coast. So it’s not very flash on the surface.

This week (Jan 20-24)

Tuesday doesn’t look too crash hot in most areas. Today’s southerly groundswell will probably nudge up a little more in size at the North Coast’s south swell magnets, thanks to another pulse of energy from a secondary front trailing the initial progression.

However, local winds are looking dicey across the North Coast, at least for the morning - mainly easterly in most areas, possibly north-east into the afternoon (across the Mid North Coast). This should allow a handful of protected locations to clean up but don’t expect anything great. 

Otherwise, a ridge across the NSW coast will also generate some low quality windswell for the Mid North and North Coasts on Tuesday. If this ridge were positioned a little further north (it’s just south of the border, and will slowly retreat poleward), then we’d see some small but useful SE swell across the semi-exposed Southern Qld points. But alas, it’s not to be. Expect small residual swell north of the border all day, with south swell magnets picking up a few rideable sets as the groundswell pushes through.

Otherwise, we’ve got some good developments starting to occur in the eastern/central Coral Sea, by way of a developing Tropical Low. This system is expected to track slowly southwards and intensify once it slips south of New Caledonia during Tuesday, reaching maximum strength later Wednesday or overnight into Thursday.

Unfortunately, core wind speeds are not expected to develop any great strength, which will keep a lid on prospective swell periods and as a result, surf size at the coast. Nevertheless we’ll see some great waves from this source towards the end of the week, and it's an ideal size range (and direction) as it'll provide good options at the beaches and the semi-exposed points - hopefully spreading the crowds away from the primary venues.

From Wednesday the general surf trend will be slowly upwards (starting from a small base) with a peak in size expected around Friday in the 3-4ft+ range at most open beaches in most areas (a little higher than our surf model is predicting right now). Surf size will then slowly taper off from Saturday. 

Fortunately, local winds are looking pretty good for everywhere but the Mid North Coast (specifically, the southern area) which will fall under the influence of a NE airstream linked to the interaction between a Tasman High and an inland trough of low pressure.

So, Southern Qld and Far Northern NSW should enjoy mainly light winds most mornings with afternoon sea breezes each day. Wednesday morning's window of opportunity might be a little shorter - especially in Northern NSW - but surf size will still be small at this time. 

This weekend (Jan 25-26)

A fairly simple outlook: slowly easing east swells both days with freshening N/NE winds (lighter in the north). Aim for Saturday as there should still be plenty of size and punch from Friday’s peak, and winds should be light early morning.

Next week (Jan 27 onwards)

We’ve got a southerly change pegged for late Sunday (in the southern Tasman Sea) which suggests we may see a small new south swell for the North Coast (exposed south swell magnets only) through Monday.

Otherwise, there’s nothing major on the synoptic charts for the long term although the Northern Tasman will remain active all weekend with a modest but somewhat stationary NE fetch, being the head of a broader trade flow across the South-western Pacific (north and north-east of New Zealand).

This suggests - as a minimum - some small persistent E’ly trade swell across open beaches for there foreseeable future. And hopefully the eventual breeding ground for a much bigger swell generating system too! Check back on Wednesday for more details.