South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 15th November)

Best Days: Sat/Sun: small building trade swells. Mon/Tues/Wed: strong E/SE swell, though onshore at times. 

Recap: Although the weekend’s swells eased into Monday, they levelled out through Tuesday and performed better than expected across Northern NSW with sets around the 3ft mark under a light variable wind regime. North of the border, open beaches maxed out around 2ft. Today we’ve seen wave heights bottom out around 1-2ft across most open beaches with generally light winds. 

This week (Nov 14th - 17th)

There’s no real discernible swell trend expected over the next few days. 

We have no new swells inbound, but our eastern swell window has seen periods of moderate activity over the last week or so, all of which should contribute minor energy to exposed beaches. 

Winds should be much the same as the last few days, early light and variable with an afternoon sea breeze. The Lower Mid North Coast may see slightly stronger winds out of the NE at times but in general no great strength is expected.

Make sure you’ve got a decent grovel board in your quiver. 

This weekend (Nov 18th - 19th)

We’ve got a couple of seperate swells expected from the weekend onwards. 

A complex E’ly dip currently forming in the South Pacific between Fiji and New Caledonia is already displaying a decent E’ly infeed. This will contribute some small, useful trade swell to the region over the weekend but the main course - a bigger E/SE groundswell - is not due until early next week. 

Also over the weekend will be some similarly short to mid-range E’ly swell from a new ridge developing atop the northern ridge of a Tasman high pressure system. However it will probably just blend in with the more distant mid-range energy. 

Open beaches should slowly build into the 2ft range throughout Saturday (note: there may be a slight lag on this early morning), and should reach closer to 3ft throughout Sunday. I'm not expecting any major quality though. Expect smaller surf across protected locations, as there won't be a lot of ooomph in the energy.

Unfortunately, the ridge will remain in close proximity to the coast so the broader airstream will be E’ly through SE Qld and then E/NE thru’ NE as you head south through Northern NSW. As such, expect generally lumpy, bumpy conditions though we may see isolated pockets of lighter winds at times. 

The leading edge of the new E/SE groundswell (the first of several phases) is due to arrive on Sunday evening, but it can’t be ruled out as arriving a little earlier and possibly providing a few late sets on Sunday just before dinner. This is expected to be worth 3-4ft+, however I’ll have a little more confidence on the timing on Friday. 

Next week (Nov 20th onwards)

So yeah - we’ve still got a decent E/SE groundswell on the way for early next week (which I’ve been discussing for almost 12 days now!), thanks to a deepening E’ly dip over the coming days that’ll form a broad low just north of New Zealand.

However, getting a fix on estimated wave heights is hard because the atmospheric models are still moving around on the position and strength of the responsible low, and it’s now starting to push dangerously close to New Zealand’s North Island. In the past, these kinds of systems have sometimes seen their fetch bisected, which has immediately halved swell potential, though we’re not at that stage… yet. 

The main thing to point out is that the fetch will be predominantly aligned E/SE thru SE, which is aimed into the Coral Sea. 

Its most direct coastal target is the Sunshine Coast, but the coastal alignment north of the border swings back to the NNW, so swell energy from this direction arrives at a slightly obtuse angle, favouring exposed northern ends for the most size and producing slightly smaller waves across the outer points (relative to exposed beaches on an E/SE facing coast like Ballina), with even smaller surf across the protected points.  

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great direction for the SE Qld coast. But this swell direction usually produces the biggest surf across the Tweed and Byron coasts, and then - because of the fetch’s latitude just north of New Zealand's North Island - then results in slightly smaller waves south from Yamba. Not much, but enough to discuss in these notes.

Anyway, this is much of a muchness as we’re looking at a firm ridge against the coast maintaining E’ly winds for much of the swell’s duration (peaking Monday and Tuesday, easing Wednesday). If anything we’ll see more of an E/SE thru’ possible SE breeze across the Sunshine and maybe Gold Coast, but south of about Yamba winds are more likely to veer E/NE. 

As for size, exposed beaches along the Ballina stretch should see 5-6ft sets. North of the border I’m expecting 4-5ft surf across open beaches and outer points of the Gold and Sunshine Coasts (smaller across protected locations). The Mid North Coast will probably some in somewhere between (so, 4-5ft+?). 

Anyway, I’ll be able to revise these figures a lot better on Friday as we’ll be close to maturity for this low and therefore much more confidence on core wind strength. 

Looking beyond this and a blocking pattern is expected to remain in place for the rest of the week, and although the E/SE swell will ease rapidly from Wednesday onwards, we’ll see small to moderate levels of mid range E’ly swell rebuilt later in the week and through the weekend from the northern flank of a Tasman high.  

In fact, long range modelling is showing a deepening coastal trough early in the following week that could generate a significant local NE swell around Tuesday 28th/Wednesday 29th November (though more likely for southern locations than northern locations). More on this in Friday’s update.