South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 22nd June)

Best Days: Thurs, maybe early Fri: small intermittent S'ly swell across Northern NSW with offshore winds. Expect tiny conditions in SE Qld. Sat: large windy S'ly swell, best suited to protected spots. Sun: large S'ly tending S/SE groundswell with light offshore winds. Mon: large easing S/SE swell with freshening NW tending W/SW winds. 

Recap: Tiny leftover surf at most beaches on Tuesday, flat at many locations. A new S’ly swell has built across Northern NSW today though the acute southerly direction has confined the only rideable waves to south facing beaches (2-3ft sets). Everywhere else has remained tiny.

This week (Thursday 23rd - Friday 24th)

There’s nothing amazing to finish the working week, especially if you’re in SE Qld. 

Our eastern swell window has been quite for some time, and the only new energy pushing up the coast is from the south. It's only favouring exposed south swell magnets south of Byron Bay too.

This trend will continue into Thursday before easing slowly into Friday. Light winds early Thursday will freshen from the NW into the afternoon (gusty in the south) before tending fresh W/NW on Friday morning and then W/SW into the afternoon, possibly at strong to gale force strength across the Mid North Coast as a vigorous front sweeps in from the west. 

Size wise, Thursday will offer the biggest surf potential with perhaps occasional 2-3ft sets at south swell magnets in Northern NSW (tiny elsewhere, including most of SE Qld). A small drop in swell size and period throughout Friday - along with the strengthening winds - will make it very hard to get enthusiastic about surfing as surf size falls back during the day. 

So, if you’ve got flexible options over the next couple of days, aim for Thursday and hit the highway for a swell magnet south of Byron.

This weekend (Saturday 25th - Sunday 26th)

The models are still holding steady for the weekend.

If anything, there’s been a slight easing in core wind strength for the initial part of this system (overnight Friday) but that doesn't matter much as it was generally modelled to form on the south-western periphery of our swell window anyway.

Most of the broadscale developments in the central Tasman Sea look to be on track, with a deep, powerful Tasman Low winding up all day Saturday to reach peak late afternoon. We’ll see a building S’ly windswell through Saturday followed by better quality S/SE groundswell through Sunday. 

And that’s the key component to be working around this weekend. Saturday’s initial swell increase will be short in period, very directional (southerly) and also accompanied with a heck of a lot of wind (mainly SW), most notably in Northern NSW. Whilst this will provide workable options at protected locations, better quality surf is expected through Sunday as the wavelength draws out - especially in SE Qld, as these longer period swells will have a touch more SE in its direction which should allow more size to bend in to the coast.

So, how big? Considering the upwards trend expected all day Saturday we should see south facing beaches in Northern NSW reaching 8ft+ by late afternoon. Locations not directly open to the south will be much smaller (say, 5-6ft+ open beaches, 3-4ft sheltered southern ends). Keep in mind that we’ll be starting from a smaller base early morning, especially in the Far North. 

Across SE Qld, the outer points should start to reach 3ft by late Saturday though the timing of the upwards trend is not yet clear. It is likely to be very small through the early part of the morning at this stage, so I wouldn’t recommend aiming for a surf until lunchtime at the earliest. And more sheltered inner Qld points (hello, Noosa!) will remain very small on Saturday owing to the unfavourable swell direction. 

On Sunday, we’ll see a slightly narrower range in wave heights thanks to the swell direction shifting S/SE during the day. South facing beaches in Northern NSW should still be punching north of 8ft+, particularly into the afternoon when I’m expecting this second phase of groundswell to really start showing itself (so, there may be a period “between pulses” early Sunday, where it’s a little smaller than expected). Again, open beaches are looking at large 6ft+ sets through the afternoon and even sheltered regions should see solid 4ft surf throughout the day.

In fact, surface wind forecasts suggest we could see more size than that (10ft+ at exposed Northern NSW south swell magnets late Sunday) but I'm holding back as core winds are mainly aimed at points east of the Australian mainland, and this could slightly impact potential heights (as we'd be seeing more sideband, than direct energy). But I'll compare model output on Friday and revise accordingly. 

Across SE Qld, Sunday should deliver solid 3-4ft+ surf at most of the outer points on Sunday, with smaller waves across the inner/sheltered points and solid sets to 6ft+ at south facing beaches. Again, I am expecting the upper end of this size range more so into the afternoon than during the morning.

But the crucial difference with Sunday is that the Tasman low is expected to track further east, away from the coast, leaving the region under a light W’ly breeze. Exposed beaches - particularly in Northern NSW - may see some residual wobble from Saturday’s winds, but the points should all cope really well with this combo with clean conditions at most spots.

Therefore, Sunday is absolutely the pick of the forecast period at this stage. 

Next week (Monday 27th onwards)

The weekend's large surf is expected to ease into Monday though the morning session could still see a healthy percentage of Sunday afternoon’s peak in size. At this stage I’m going for 6-8ft+ across south facing beaches south of Byron early morning (4-6ft remaining open beaches, 3ft protected points), easing during the day. 

In SE Qld, we may fluke into a few 3-4ft sets early morning at the outer points but it’ll ease back to 2-3ft during the day, maybe a even a little smaller mid-late afternoon. 

Conditions are looking good for the open beaches on Monday (perhaps those not picking up all of the size!) with freshening NW winds tending W/SW later. So this may cause some problems at the points until very late in the day. I’ll have a better idea on this in Friday’s update.

Looking further ahead, and we’ve got a series of new fronts expected to push through the Tasman Sea from Monday onwards that should maintain moderate southerly swells through much of the rest of the week. They won’t be anywhere near as large as what we’re expecting over the weekend, but south facing beaches in Northern NSW should see surf size fluctuating in the 4-5ft range from Tuesday thru’ Thursday or maybe early Friday.

I don’t like the look of this next frontal passage for SE Qld, so if you’re only able to surf north of the border over the coming week or so, aim to get wet from late Saturday thru’ Sunday and Monday as we’ll probably be back to a small spell of waves through the second half of next week. 

More on this in Friday’s update.