South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 11th August)

Best Days: Mon: chance for a fun south swell across the Mid North Coast, but local winds could spoil the party (they certainly will to the north). Tues/Wed/Thurs/Fri: fun trade swell, best suited to SE Qld, specifically the southern Gold Coast points. 

Recap: Thursday saw tiny conditions across much of the region, just a foot of weak leftover swell at exposed beaches. Today started off small but a minor SE swell pushed up across Northern NSW during the day, and a secondary S’ly groundswell that is now peaking across Southern NSW (with occ 2-3ft sets) is now nosing into the Mid North Coast, and will probably peak overnight across Northern NSW. We’re seeing 2-3ft sets from the SE swell across Northern NSW right now, and 1-2ft waves at swell magnets on the Gold Coast, with tiny surf at the Sunshine Coast (though there are little lines appearing, as per the surfcam grab from Moffats a little while ago). Yesterday’s northerlies have given way to mainly SW tending S’ly winds across Northern NSW and SE Qld.

Small but clean lines at Moffats for the longboards and street sweepers 

This weekend (Sat 13th - Sun 14th August)

Unfortunately the outlook for waves this weekend remains grim.

Today’s SE swell and the small pulse of S’ly swell advancing along the coast are both expected to ease back through Saturday morning. Conditions are expected to be clean with light winds (ahead of an afternoon sea breeze) but SE Qld will remain tiny, with only south facing beaches in Northern NSW - specifically, south of Byron Bay down to about Coffs - picking up stray 2ft sets of leftover swell early morning, before it slowly eases throughout the day. 

Elsewhere, surf conditions will remain very small at best. 

On Sunday, a ridge is expected to slowly develop across the Coral Sea and it’ll eventually influence the coastal margin from SE Qld down to Southern NSW thanks to a front pushing into the lower Tasman Sea. This will swing the winds around to the southern quadrant and freshen, though this may not happen until the afternoon. Prior to this we’re looking at early light W/SW winds in most areas. 

Unfortunately, there are no new swells expected during this time so you’ll have to sniff around the exposed south swell magnets south of Byron for scraps of energy. Across SE Qld it’s expected to remain very small indeed.

Next week (Mon 15th August onwards)

A strong front pushing underneath Tasmania overnight Saturday and into Sunday morning is expected to generate a couple of pulses of south swell for early next week. 

The first swell is due across the Mid North Coast on Monday morning, and the Far North Coast into the afternoon, with a second pulse expected overnight before easing through Tuesday. Unfortunately, the atmospheric models have continued to downgrade the responsible front over the last few runs - trending it more zonal in alignment, and also pushing it more quickly through the swell window than is ideal. 

Our surf forecast model isn’t picking up this energy very well either (estimating just 2ft surf), but I think we’ll see some decent waves across the Mid North Coast with sets in the 3ft range at south facing beaches.

Far Northern NSW will pick up this south swell too but the concern north of Coffs Harbour is that the strengthening ridge will generate fresh S/SE winds during Monday, which will wipe out conditions across open south facing beaches (who'll be picking up the south swell). Protected beaches will probably be too small to be worthwhile.

Local conditions should be a little more manageable across the Mid North Coast but even here we’re likely to see some form of southerly breeze during the day. So keep your expectations low. 

SE Qld won’t see any of this south swell, but that’s no big drama as there are much better waves in store for the rest of the week. The Coral Sea ridge is expected to anchor itself in place for a few days early next week, generating a punchy trade swell that should build from late Monday afternoon through into Tuesday, peaking on Wednesday with sets around 3-4ft at outer points and open beaches. The Sunshine Coast may see a few bigger sets, though the protected inner points (such as Noosa) will be considerably smaller. 

Winds will be mainly moderate to fresh SE so the open stretches will be a write off but I’m confident that there’ll be some good options across the outer points (specifically, the southern Gold Coast). Early morning may also see brief, isolated regions of light SW winds, for example the southern Gold Coast. 

The best surfcams to monitor this swell across the Sunshine Coast will be Noosa Heads (click here) and Alex Headland (click here), whilst on the Gold Coast you'll be best off viewing our Greenmount (click here) and Snapper Rocks (click here) surfcams. 

Wave heights from this trade swell will become smaller with increasing southerly latitude but Wednesday’s initial peak should still reach 2ft+ across the Mid North Coast. Winds will be much more favourable here; mainly light and variable with sea breezes. 

The Far Northern NSW coast will otherwise see bigger surf; winds will be a little lighter than SE Qld (thanks to it being further away from the ridge) but it'll still be enough to confine the best waves to sheltered southern corners. 

From Thursday onwards, surf size will slowly ease and local winds should improve in the north as the ridge breaks down. A second swell source is expected to fire up at the tail end of the ridge early in the week - a small low will to develop just NW of New Zealand around Monday (though poorly aligned) before setting up camp north of New Zealand on Tuesday and Wednesday (better aligned, but further away). This should provide some small reinforcing E’ly swell through the backhalf of the week and next weekend as the trade swell starts to tail off. So, expect fun surf across open beaches for Thursday, Friday and Saturday. 

The longer term outlook doesn’t have much size on the card thanks to an absence of swell generating systems in the Tasman Sea, but it looks like our far eastern swell window will remain relatively active, with small E’ly swells likely through into the following week.

Have a great weekend, see you Monday!