South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 30th September)

Best Days: Wed: new S'ly swell across the Mid North Coast. Thurs: easing S'ly swell across Northern NSW ahead of a large S'ly swell reaching the Mid North Coast in the morning, and the Far North Coast in the afternoon. Some small late sets across SE Qld south swell magnets, tiny elsewhere. Fri: solid, easing S'ly swell across Northern NSW. Small easing surf at SE Qld south swell magnets, tiny elsewhere. 

Recap: A new south swell provided good waves across some Northern NSW beaches on Thursday, reaching 3-4ft across the Mid North Coast and 2-3ft across the Far North Coast (against a regional forecast of 2-3ft+). SE Qld remained tiny all day, and northerly winds strengthen throughout the afternoon, whipping up a small NE windswell that held into this morning. Many beaches saw only 1.5ft surf tops, with the most size concentrated around the southern Gold Coast (2-3ft) and Tweed Coasts (2ft). Winds were NW all morning before tending W’ly throughout the afternoon, and there are still a few small waves on offer at exposed beaches (as per the bottom D’Bah surfcam image below, taken a short time ago). 

D'Bah this morning

D'Bah this afternoon

This weekend (Oct 1 - Oct 2)

I’ve been discussing the possibility of a flat weekend since Monday, and unfortunately it looks like it’s going to come true for just about everywhere.

Our current N’ly windswell will ease rapidly overnight, leaving most beaches tiny to flat for Saturday. Some exposed spots may draw in tiny residual energy from today throughout the morning, but for the most part I’m not expecting anything rideable across most coasts. Conditions will however be clean with offshore winds. 

Sunday will repeat these characteristics across all beaches.

However, the Lower Mid North Coast has an outside chance for a very late arrival of small new south swell on Sunday afternoon, originating from a fetch of westerly gales exiting eastern Bass Strait on Saturday. 

It won’t be very well aligned within our swell window - models guidance has a straight W’ly fetch, and ideally we need at least a small degree of south in the direction. However, the fetch is expected to be quite wide and and strong, and will retain strength from Saturday afternoon into Sunday morning. 

This should generate a strong W’ly swell across the southern Tasman Sea, that is expected to spread back into the Southern NSW coast during Sunday, and may just reach the Lower Mid North Coast during the last few hours of the day. 

I’m not very confident that we’ll see much, if any size - maybe some stray 1-2ft sets at south swell magnets - but in the absence of anything significant otherwise, it’s worth keeping an eye out for if you’re in that neck of the woods. 

Everywhere else: it looks like we’ve got two days of activities away from the surf zone. 

Next week (Oct 3 onwards)

Sunday’s late S’ly swell isn’t really worth getting too excited about, but for what it’s worth, south swell magnets across Northern NSW may see some small inconsistent lines on Monday in the 1-2ft range. 

Unfortunately, freshening northerly winds are expected to ruin surf conditions at all but the most protected northern corners. They’ll also whip up a small, low quality N’ly windswell for exposed north facing beaches.

A fresh westerly change is then expected overnight on Monday, leading to much cleaner conditions on Tuesday. I’m not expecting much leftover NE swell from Monday so it’s likely that most coasts will trend flat on Tuesday.

As a side note, our Mid North Coast forecast points have a SW swell reaching 2-3ft at south facing beaches on Tuesday, but I think this is an anomaly/bug in the code. The source of this swell is a local strong to gale force W tending W/SW fetch, and whilst it’s theoretically possible that we could see a small spread up the coast from this source, I’m highly skeptical that anything will eventuate. If anything, we may see some small southerly lines at south swell magnets across the Far North and even some of the outer exposed swell magnets across SE Qld, but honestly - don’t hold your breath. There’s a much greater chance that it’ll remain tiny to flat.

Anyway, these regional westerly gales will be associated with a series of intense fronts crossing the SE corner of the country. The storm track is expected to ride unusually north in latitude, which is not great for NSW surf prospects as it focuses the primary fetch away from our swell window(s). 

However, the sheer breadth, strength and length of the overall fetch (encompassing every frontal system) is very impressive - we’re looking at four, almost five consecutive days of gale force winds across Tasmania. 

The problem is that the storm track will be very zonal in alignment, so any swell we see at the coast will have to spread back north - resulting in a much smaller percentage of size. 

That being said, such pattern often exhibit brief ‘kinks’ in the synoptic flow (before and behind each front), with the fetch trailing the change often just south of west (or ideally, south-west). This helps to boost size potential wing to the better alignment within our swell window. And therefore, these are the patterns we’re looking for.

The first ‘kink’ is expected to occur later Tuesday and overnight into Wednesday, which should give rise to a new southerly swell across Southern NSW throughout Wednesday, reaching the Lower Mid North Coast in the afternoon, just up to about Coffs or maybe Yamba. Provisional surf size is around the 3-4ft mark at south facing beaches but smaller everywhere else. 

This swell will then peak overnight and trend down into Thursday, showing best early morning across south swell magnets south of Byron Bay (very little size is expected north of the border). Surf size will already be easing across the Mid North Coast by this time, and all beaches not open to the south will be much smaller.

However, a stronger kink with much stronger core winds is then expected later Wednesday, and could result in a much larger south swell through Thursday, arriving across the Mid North Coast in the morning and the Far North Coast into the afternoon. 

If current model guidance holds out we’ll be looking at easy 5-6ft+ sets at south facing beaches, but much smaller surf elsewhere. Most SE Qld beaches would again dip out in the size department due to the strong southerly direction but the region's handful of south swell magnets could see occasional 2-3ft sets. 

However, due to this system's close proximity to the mainland, we’ll have to reassess the model guidance on Monday.

The outlook beyond Thursday is for easing energy through Friday ahead of a smaller weekend of background, residual south swell. But that’s still a long time away so let’s see how things progress next week.

Have a great weekend, see you Monday!