South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 6th March)

Best Days: Sat/Sun: good south swell (biggest at south swell magnets in Northern NSW, only small in SE Qld) but surf early before the onshores kick in. Mid-next week onwards: slowly building E'ly swell through into the weekend.

Recap: Thursday was very small and lacklustre in most regions. Friday however has been a completely different story with a strong S’ly swell pushing along the coast. Wave heights generally fell within expectations in SE Qld (building to 1-2ft most beaches, up to 2-3ft at Snapper - see pic below from our new surfcam - and 3ft+ south facing beaches) however surf size was larger than expected in Northern NSW with 6ft+ sets at exposed south facing locations. 

This weekend (Mar 7-8)

Looks like more of the same for the weekend. Today’s existing south swell will taper off through Saturday morning but a second southerly groundswell - much of the same characteristics as today’s event - is expected to push northwards across the coast during the day. 

This swell will be the byproduct of a strong secondary front rounding the Tasmanian corner tonight, however it will last a shorter time in our swell window thanks to a more easterly storm track. 

Based based on today’s performance I’ve upped size expectations for Saturday, with south facing beaches in Northern NSW likely to reach a peak around 5-6ft, with 3ft waves at remaining open beaches and smaller surf inside protected southern corners.

We’re looking at an early-mid morning arrival across the Mid North Coast, reaching the Far North Coast by late morning and crossing the border in the early afternoon. So ahead of this, wave heights are likely to be smaller off the backside of today's event.

North of Byron Bay, wave heights will again taper off considerably due to the swell direction. So, allowing for a slow easing trend through early Saturday morning, wave heights should perk up into the afternoon but size will probably be restricted to 1-2ft across most SE Qld open beaches, reaching 2-3ft at the Snapper contest site and then 3ft+ at the region’s handful of south facing beaches (expect the upper end of this size range towards the end of the day).

As for local conditions - freshening easterly winds in most areas (tending northeast south of about Yamba) will create bumpy conditions through the afternoon but winds should be light and variable in the morning. There may be some lingering bumps early morning from overnight light to moderate onshore/crossshore winds but in general it'll be on the improve fairly quickly.

On Sunday, we’ll see an early peak in S’ly swell - probably of a similar size as late Saturday (north of Coffs Harbour) but the easing trend will set in early morning across the Mid North Coast, and all locations will see a steady drop in size during the day.

Again, onshore winds are expected to freshen during the day - most likely with an earlier onset than Saturday morning - so you’ll have to aim for the dawn patrol for the cleanest conditions. Overall there’ll be options but I suspect the winds will create a few problems in many areas.

Next week (Mar 9 onwards)

The first half of next week looks generally small and uninteresting for the most part.

A general lack of activity within our primary swell windows from Sunday onwards means that we’ll be relying on residual energy to initially keep open beaches rideable. Sunday’s south swell will continue to ease into Monday, and a slowly developing trade flow SW of New Caledonia should slowly build a small E’ly swell for the SE Qld and Far Northern NSW coasts through into the middle of the week. 

No great size is expected at first (just a couple of feet) however this fetch will slowly broaden and strength through Tuesday and Wednesday in response to a developing Tropical Cyclone to the north, so the second half of the week could see some reasonable sets across open beaches north of Byron, in the 3-4ft range. Let’s wait and see how this flow pans out.

In Northern NSW south to Seal Rocks, weak pressure patterns will create light winds and surf size will remain small in general most days. A moderate southerly change is pegged for Friday but nothing amazing is expected the surf department at this stage.

Elsewhere, the aforementioned Tropical Cyclone that’s modelled to develop out in the Solomons/Vanuatu region early next week is already causing a stir via its long range technicolour WAMS. 

Now, there are a few things we need to consider for the long term forecast around this system.

Yes, there is a chance for a significant swell event from the cyclone itself. However, as we’ve seen a couple of times already this year, Tropical Cyclones are very tricky to forecast, even at short range - so we have to be careful about how the level of speculation at such early stages - especially considering the small variations in storm tracks over the last few model runs (it seems to be alternating between a southward path west of Vanuatu, and east of Vanuatu - each of which would have considerably different outcomes in the surf department). 

And, as we all know - via the hype around the ‘Cyclone Marcia swell’, which actually didn’t have anything to do with TC Marcia, but was instead the result of a super charged trade swell - there are two swell events to consider from this developing synoptic pattern: (1) cyclone swell, and (2) trade swell. As such there’s definitely some merit in assessing them on an individual basis.

So, looking at the trade swell first - I’ve already mentioning the strengthening easterly flow during the week that’ll probably generate 3-4ft of trade swell through the latter part of next week. Assuming this cyclone isn’t quickly steered to the south-east (as has been suggested in the latest model run this evening), we should see a peak in trade swell around 4-5ft next weekend, or possibly early in the following week. A strengthening ridge across the Qld coast in the wake of Friday's southerly change reaffirms these prospects. 

The cyclone potential on the other hand has an enormous range of possible surf outcomes, depending on where it tracks, at what speed and at what strength.

Until the latest model runs this evening, there was some potential for a large swell event developing later next weekend however this seems to have gone astray in the latest model runs - either by way of a delay in its development cycle, or a possible shunt to the south-east. However we really need another three or four days (or, more preferably - just some time after the cyclone has developed) to fully assess the potential as there’s simply too many variables on offer. I hate sitting on the fence but this is a really complex pattern ahead.

Nevertheless, this weather system will absolutely be the focal point of these forecast notes for the coming week and a half - I'm really looking forward to tracking its movements daily.

See you Monday!