South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 20th February)

Best Days: Small E'ly swell building Wed/Thurs (in SE Qld/Far Northern NSW). Stronger E'ly groundswell Fri/Sat (in SE Qld/Far Northern NSW). Small S'ly swell in Northern NSW Thurs/Fri. Plenty of trade swell next week!

Recap: Small swells and mainly northerly winds haven’t offered anything worthwhile for SE Qld or Northern NSW surfers in recent days. Winds have swung S’ly today though. 

This week (Feb 21st - 24th)

Well, it’s nice to see a few days ahead without the capital “N” in the wind progs.

That being said, surf size will remain small for the next few days so with southerly winds in general you’ll have to look towards the sheltered points in SE Qld for the cleanest options. And many days there won’t be quite enough swell.

Across the Mid North Coast we’re looking at an extended period of troughy weather and therefore mainly light variable winds and sea breezes. 

A developing easterly fetch south of Fiji over the weekend is generating a small E’ly swell that’ll build slowly from Tuesday through Wednesday ahead of a peak on Thursday. Set waves will be slow and very inconsistent, topping out in the 2-3ft range at open beaches across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW, and you’ll have to make the most of early light SW winds each day.

Expect slightly smaller surf south from about Yamba from this source.

Also building from Wednesday afternoon through Thursday across Northern NSW will be a small south swell, generated by a developing cut-off low currently S/SE of Tasmania. However it’s a tricky system with not especially strong surface winds, a short fetch length and a slight S’ly track as it continues to develop. This will keep a lid on swell size, and the acute source will confine the biggest waves to a handful of south swell magnets south of Byron Bay. 

Expect perhaps 2ft to maybe 2-3ft sets through Thursday at best, easing from Friday. The east swell probably has a little more potential and should offer a slightly broader coverage of surf, despite the lower periods and reduced swell strength. 

Overnight Thursday, the leading edge of a long range E’ly groundswell will make landfall and we should see some good waves across most regions on Friday.

The source of this swell is a broad interaction between a tropical depression and a large high pressure system, way out east of New Zealand. However the resulting fetch has developed within a reasonable part of the New Zealand swell shadow, which will restrict surf size south of a point in Northern NSW - at a rough guess, somewhere between Byron Bay and Coffs Harbour. Though, such distinctions are very tricky owing to the complex manner in which swell energy bends in and around large distant obstacles, so confidence is only low on how much size we'll see south of about the border. 

Nevertheless, as a rough estimate it looks like we should see set waves around the 4ft mark across SE Qld and perhaps Far Northern NSW on Friday. The sets will be extremely inconsistent - this swell will have travelled a very large distance so it’s conceivable that the biggest waves could be twenty minutes of more apart. However there’ll be some small E’ly and S’ly swell on offer at remaining beaches. Expect smaller surf across the Mid North Coast.

Friday’s winds look mainly light and variable with sea breezes in the south, with early SW winds tending moderate S/SE north from Ballina.

But let me reiterate just how inconsistent it's likely to be on Friday - you'll need to be extremely patient for the sets. 

This weekend (Feb 25th - 26th)

Friday’s new E’ly groundswell will ease very slowly through the weekend. 

The models are showing a slight jump in swell periods early Saturday morning. This is related to a deep subtropical low sitting at the tail end of the South Pacific fetch, which is displaying impressive wind strengths - however it’s located such an enormous distance from the coast (and is essentially detached from the primary fetch, which is migrating slowly westwards) that the increase in swell period will probably be tempered by the likelihood that this particular swell train will be very small in size.

The reason it's arriving shortly after the initial E'ly groundswell - despite the longer travel distance (see chart below) - is that the longer periods are travelling faster, which means it would eventually overrun the shorter period E'ly swells ahead of it.

Anyway, that’s a really long way of saying that Saturday morning should probably kick off with a similar size range as per Friday afternoon (very inconsistent 4ft sets across SE Qld, with a minor underlying short range E'ly swell around 2ft, smaller south of Ballina), but with a slow easing trend during the day, and an increasing level of inconsistency. Once again, the time between the bigger sets will be considerable.

This E'ly swell will then continue to ease a little more into Sunday. 

As for winds, Saturday looks good with a continuation of the light/variable (down south) and SW tending S/SE (up north) regime, however a southerly change will push across Southern NSW on Saturday, reaching Northern NSW and SE Qld into Sunday. This will freshen S/SE winds across all regions into Sunday, focusing the best conditions to the sheltered points. 

Next week (Feb 27th onwards)

Looks like we have a renewal of trade winds through the Coral Sea and Northern Tasman Sea next week, which will build plenty of short range trade swell across SE Qld and Northern NSW. Hopefully a sign of an upcoming blocking pattern and therefore extended run of (overdue) summer swell for the region.