South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 19th October)

Best Days: Thurs AM: small clean E'ly swell across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW. Tues: solid SE swell in Northern NSW (smaller in SE Qld) with good winds. 

Recap: There’s been some fun small waves across the coast for the last two days. Tuesday morning saw small, rapidly easing NE swell from Monday afternoon but a small E’ly swell filled in underneath during the day, producing 2ft waves across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW (smaller south from about Ballina or Yamba). This small east swell persisted into today with occasional 2ft sets about the coast, even one or two bigger bombs across the Sunny Coast, however it’s quite tidally influenced and early light winds have swung to an onshore afternoon breeze, slightly deteriorating conditions.

Tasty beachies on the Sunshine Coast this morning

This week (Oct 20th - Oct 21st)

Oh, and have you seen our new surfcams at Sunshine Beach and Coolum? Check 'em out, I think you'll be pretty stoked.

Our recent source of small east swell dried up overnight, which means Thursday morning will probably see the last pulse of reasonable energy across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW. Model guidance is holding things just in as per today though with a very slight easing trend. 

So, expect inconsistent peaky 2ft sets in the morning (upper end of this size range predomimantly across the Sunshine Coast) with wave heights gradually becoming smaller as you head south of Byron. It’s likely to once again be quite susceptible to the daily tidal fluctuations too so make the most of what you see in front of you at the time.

Early light winds and sea breezes are expected across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW, but south of about Ballina or Yamba we’ll see a moderate ridge build across the coast which will freshen easterly winds earlier. 

However, there is no major surf expected out of the south, just a small pulse of weak energy that might top 2ft at south facing beaches (south of Byron Bay) if we’re lucky. Definitely not worth working around. 

On Friday we’ll see slightly smaller easterly swell across the region, and just a small trace of leftover south swell across Northern NSW’s south swell magnets. 

Northerly winds will become fresh and gusty during the day so conditions won’t be good. Early morning has the only surfable potential, across SE Qld (mainly the Sunshine Coast) with a few small beachies before the wind picks up.

This weekend (Oct 22nd - Oct 23rd)

Saturday looks pretty ordinary just about everywhere with small swells and freshening northerly winds. I really can’t see there being anything of value across any region. 

Sunday is a little different, with a developing multi-centered low pressure system in the Tasman Sea expected to drive strong southerly winds across Northern NSW before dawn, reaching the Gold and Sunshine Coasts through the middle of the morning. 

Unfortunately, the swell potential from this source is rather low based on current model guidance. SE Qld won’t benefit at all due to the thin width of the fetch (maybe a small wave at south facing beaches in the a’noon, but they’ll be wind affected) whilst Northern NSW will see bigger surf at south facing beaches - but once again, very wind affected. 

The fetch doesn’t look consolidated enough to produce swell of any size or strength, sufficient for a reasonable push into protected locations, but we are still a few days away and the models may move around. So let’s revise this outlook on Friday.

But if you had to hedge your bets, Sunday looks only marginally better than Saturday for waves - and only because it’ll be on the build, and winds will be out of the south which at least offers a few options with a compromise between size and quality. 

Next week (Oct 24th onwards)

Sunday’s Tasman low is now modelled to intensify off the SW tip of New Zealand’s South Island during the day, before slingshotting around to the north-west for a brief period into the evening. The models have this as a very significant system with core winds in excess of 50kts which could deliver swell periods in the 16-17 second range (which is slightly capped for this wind speed, owing to the relatively short travel duration). 

In any case, this event should set up a solid SE groundswell for much of the NSW coast; even SE Qld should see some good waves from this source (owing to the more eastern position of this low, and the very strong core wind speeds).

At this stage, we’ll see temporarily easing S’ly windswell on Monday (down from whatever heights are reached Sunday) before the new SE swell pushed across Northern NSW early Tuesday morning, reaching SE Qld by lunchtime (I'll update the timing on Friday). 

At this stage Northern NSW’s exposed beaches could be looking at solid 5-6ft+ sets at the height of the swell, and conditions look nice and clean with light winds and sea breezes.

The swell direction will significantly cap surf size north of the border but I wouldn’t be surprised to see 2-3ft waves across the outer SE Qld points with slightly bigger surf at open south facing beaches (but smaller across protected points). Let’s hope the models don’t move around too much on this event as it’s one of the best looking synoptic charts (for Northern NSW at least) we’ve had in many months.

Looking further ahead and following Tuesday’s swell we’re looking steadily easing surf on Wednesday ahead of a period of small surf through the second half of next week. 

See you on Friday!