South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 16th December)

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Best Days: Sun: possible late small surf on the outer SE Qld points. Small clean beachies early morning. Later Mon/Tues: fun S'ly swell for Northern NSW. Mon/Tues: fun building trade swells with reasonably good conditions in the mornings. Wed: good trade swell but N'ly winds will wreck conditions. Thurs/Fri: small trade swell (possible late boost) with good winds for the outer points. 

Recap: Temporary easing N’ly winds swung NW on Thursday morning before freshening from the north into Thursday afternoon, and persisting throughout today. Small levels of trade swell have provided plenty of rideable waves (in and amongst the brief windows of workable winds) across SE Qld, but with much smaller surf south of Byron and Ballina.

This weekend (Dec 17th - 18th)

Saturday looks pretty unattractive all round.

An approaching southerly change across Southern NSW will freshen northerly winds across Northern NSW, so most beaches will be a write-off. A small undercurrent of trade swell will be present across most locations but with these winds it’s hardly worth working around. 

The southerly change is expected into the Lower Mid North Coast before dawn on Sunday, before arriving across Northern NSW (i.e. Ballina etc) around early/mid morning, reaching the border between 9-10am (Qld time). In addition to  a small underlying trade swell, we’ll see a building short range S’ly swell across the region into the afternoon.

Accompanying gusty southerlies will render most exposed beaches in Northern NSW too bumpy to surf, with south facing beaches will be picking up the most size (choppy afternoon sets in the 4ft+ range). Elsewhere, the low swell period and southerly direction will severely limit wave heights at protected spots. 

As for SE Qld, NW winds ahead of the change will provide an early window of small clean beach breaks but once the southerly kicks in these locations will become blown out.

There is a chance for a mid-late afternoon increase in short range S/SE swell but I don’t see a lot of merit in the trailing fetch (not long or strong enough) so I doubt we’ll see much more than a few 2ft+ runners about the outer points late in the day, with much smaller surf further down the line. Keep an eye on the obs and the cams and you could do OK. 

Next week (Dec 19th onwards)

Monday has some potential for SE Qld.

In addition to a small persistent trade swell, the new ridge across the Coral Sea should kick up occasional 2-3ft sets at outer points. We’ll see bigger surf at exposed northern ends but gusty S/SE winds will render these beaches quite bumpy.

As per usual under a maturing local ridge, the Sunshine Coast probably won’t see any deviation from the synoptic S/SE flow early Monday morning but the southern Gold Coast usually does quite well and should see light SW winds for a few hours. Overall, don’t expect much size or strength in the waves but there’ll be some rideable options.

Across Northern NSW, we’ll see a similar spread of small distant trade swell on Monday, but less short range S/SE swell (as this fetch will be aimed mainly up into the Coral Sea). However a better longer period S’ly groundswell will push up the coast throughout the day, originating from the parent low to Sunday change as it intensifies SE of Tasmania through Saturday night and Sunday morning.

This swell is expected to reach the Mid North Coast late morning/lunchtime and may not quite push up into the North Coast until very late in the day, so with mainly easing short range energy from Sunday (through Monday morning) it’s 50/50 whether there’ll be anything worthwhile on offer. Early light offshore winds at most locations south of Ballina will swing into a moderate afternoon sea breeze. 

Tuesday will see this south swell a little more prominent across the region though it will be easing in size. Occasional 3-4ft sets are possible at reliable south swell magnets south of Byron but expect size to ease throughout the day. 

From late Monday or Tuesday onwards, we will also start to see a building E/NE swell originating from a broadening E'ly fetch around the southern flank of TD04F (a tropical depression currently delivering a deluge to Fiji) which may be upgraded to a Category 1 Tropical Cyclone this evening. 

The cyclone will only be short lived at best but the supporting ridge to the south is well established and should generate a very useful trade swell for SE Qld and Northern NSW.

Wave heights should peak through Tuesday and Wednesday with good quality 3-4ft sets at most open beaches (the distant, broad nature of this swell source should ensure a more uniform coverage across the region). 

However - as always there’s a spanner to be thrown in the works, and once again this will be in the form of a freshening N’ly breeze. The Mid North Coast looks like it’ll cop it from Tuesday afternoon through into Wednesday, but SE Qld may just be spared on Tuesday with lighter afternoon winds (Wednesday looks difficult though, potentially 15-20kts from the N/NE).

A new ridge building across the region on Thursday will deliver fresh S’ly winds and a small bump in short range S/SE swell through into Friday. However the trade swell is expected to temporarily ease through this time period, down to 2-3ft. There’ll still be enough size for some small runners on the points though. 

In fact, the models are suggesting the remnants of this tropical system may form a broad trough north of New Zealand mid-next week which could result in a slight boost out of the east later next week or into the weekend. Let’s wait and see how Monday’s model runs are looking before getting too excited about that.

So overall, we have five or six individual swell sources on tap for next week - your best chance at scoring fun waves will be to work around the local wind outlook. Let’s fine tune the specifics on Monday. 

Have a great weekend!