South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 14th March)

Best Days: Plenty of waves most days, though Tues thru' Thurs will be wind affected away from the SE Qld points (OK conditions across the Mid North Coast though). Fun beachies with lighter winds on Fri and Sat, with a renewal of S'ly winds for Sun and small outer points. 

Recap: Building trade swell all weekend, reaching a peak this morning with solid 4-5ft surf at open beaches (a few bigger waves reported at some locations, but smaller on the points). Winds have been mainly E’ly, light to moderate Saturday and Monday but Sunday saw quite gusty conditions at some locations throughout the day (and plenty of rain too - over 100m recorded at some Tweed Coast locations!)

This week (Mar 15th - 18th)

We’re now on the backside of the current trade swell event, but the good news is that there’s plenty of fun surf to come. 

A temporary relaxation of the coastal ridge will turn about-face on Tuesday, with the ridge expected to strengthen about the SE Qld region and also Far Northern NSW. This will maintain fresh and gusty SE winds about many locations, so the points will offer the only workable options (brief periods of light SW winds are possible in a few selected locations early, such as Coolangatta).

The trades are still quite active in our swell window, though not quite as strong as what was seen over the weekend. We will see a temporary easing trend into Tuesday ahead of a lift into size throughout Wednesday. Tuesday morning should still manage 3ft sets at open SE Qld beaches (smaller surf south of Ballina), with a little less size possible into the afternoon, but we should see Wednesday rebuild up to 3ft, maybe even 3-4ft throughout the day (unlikely to be early morning though). Expect smaller waves across the points, and agin south of about Ballina or Yamba.

While this is going on, a broad trough is expected to develop across the Tasman Sea, and a high pressure system south of Tasmania will extend a firm ridge into Southern NSW. This high will remain slow moving for a couple of days, which will allow the trough to slowly envelop much of the Tasman Sea. 

However, wind strengths in our eastern swell window are expected to remain only moderate, so the swell potential from the east will diminish slowly through Thursday and Friday. Thursday should still see early 3ft sets at open beaches - probably across the broader SE Qld and Northern NSW region - before size falls a little into the afternoon and Friday. 

Elsewhere, the developing ridge across Southern NSW will be mainly aimed towards this region however we should see some sideband S/SE swell push up into Northern NSW, probably around Thursday. Sets of around 2-3ft+ are possible at south facing beaches, possibly a little more at locations across the Mid North Coast (up to about Coffs or Yamba). We should see this energy holding steady into Friday morning before easing throughout the day.

As for local winds, most days across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW will be affected by the ridge (i.e. fresh sou’easters), with light variable winds tending SE across the Mid North Coast. Friday should see the ridge relax sufficiently enough to all of for light variable winds and sea breezes in most locations. 

This weekend (Mar 19th - 20th)

The surf forecast for the weekend and beyond becomes quite tricky as there are several fetches expected to develop within our swell window(s). Each fetch will be favourably aligned, but generally at quite a distance from the coast. This means the resulting swells won’t be particularly powerful, and they’ll probably be of a similar size range. The end result will most likely be an extended period of peaky swell combos best suited to the open beaches.

Our most important swell window is to our east, and in general the outlook for this part of the world is quite positive. As the Tasman trough continues to develop, we’ll see a broad area of trades stretch back into the South Pacific, with a chance for a tropical depression to form south of Fiji later in the week. This should maintain inconsistent but fun 2-3ft surf across most open beaches through the weekend.

Prior to this, another fetch located closer to the mainland - south of New Caledonia from Tuesday onwards - is expected to slowly strengthen and veer anti-clockwise towards the weekend. This fetch will mainly favourite Southern NSW but Northern NSW should see some useful sideband energy from it over the weekend, again probably offering occasional sets in the 3ft range.

Note: the models aren’t picking up these swells very well right now, for reasons I’m not entirely sure. So the graphs are undercalling the weekend’s size.

Local winds look tricky for the weekend. A weak southerly change is expected to push across the NSW coast, reaching the Mid North Coast on Saturday afternoon. Northerly winds will precede it - across Northern NSW and SE Qld (most of Saturday) - but at this stage it doesn’t look like they’ll be too strong. 

At this stage it’s likely that the change will push north into remaining regions by Sunday morning, allowing fresh S/SE winds to develop in its wake but we’ll have to give the models a few days to sort themselves out.

Next week (Mar 21st onwards)

Plenty of surf for next week too. 

The ridge behind the weekend’s change looks like it’ll be quite broad (if not overly strong) which means we should see plenty of short-to-mid-range S/SE swell through the first half of the week. This will best be aimed towards Northern NSW though (and not SE Qld) and it’ll only be beneficial if local winds are favourable. 

Otherwise, we should still be seeing small long range E’ly swell throughout this time frame, extending from the broad trade flow developing north of New Zealand later this week. Right now I don’t think there’l be much more than inconsistent 3ft sets from it, but there’s always a chance that the models will upgrade the developing tropical system south of Fiji (around Friday) which could lead to an upgrade in future forecasts. Let’s keep an eye on it anyway.