South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 2nd April)

Best Days: Thurs: light winds, small beachies in Northern NSW. Fri: keep an eye out for a possible long range E'ly swell in SE Qld, mainly Sunshine Coast. Sun: fun S'ly swell across the Mid North Coast, with light winds. 

Recap: We’ve seen plenty of SE swell across Northern NSW over the last few days, easing from 4ft at exposed beaches yesterday to 3ft today, whilst SE Qld beaches have seen smaller surf easing from 2-3ft yesterday to 2ft today. Winds remained out of the south both days though today has seen much lighter strength; they’ve even gone NE across the Mid North Coast this afternoon.

Today’s Forecaster Notes are brought to you by Rip Curl

This week (May 1 - 4) 

Our swell windows have eased considerably over the last few days so surf size will continue to abate into the rest of the week out of the SE.

Northern NSW’s exposed south facing beaches will continue to see the most size, perhaps some 2-3ft sets early Thursday easing throughout the day and smaller surf through Friday. It’ll be smaller elsewhere and winds will be light and variable with sea breezes on Thursday so conditions should be clean. Friday will see freshening N/NW winds (mainly across the Mid North Coast) so protected northern corners will see the cleanest conditions. Further north, there'll be less wind so most open beaches should be workable, though it'll be pretty small. 

SE Qld will also see small easing swells from today through Thursday, so there won’t be a lot of action away from exposed northern ends.

However, a long range E’ly groundswell mentioned in Monday’s notes is still a possibility for Friday, generated by a deep sub tropical low well south of Tahiti over the weekend. 

The large travel distance isn’t so much a concern, as is the southern latitude of the fetch, sitting well inside the swell shadow of New Zealand. This will block swell energy from reaching most of Australia’s East Coast, however we can’t discount a small degree of refraction and diffraction around the North Island, potentially favouring SE Qld beaches. 

As such, there is a low percentage chance that Friday will see a very inconsistent building E’ly swell across exposed beaches north of about Byron. Even if the wave buoys spike with swell periods (say, around 13-14 seconds), this won’t guarantee an increase in surf size - there’ll be a concurrent absence of swell trains across the region on Friday, so the buoys will be able to pick up faint long range energy a little more clearly. 

Nevertheless, we can’t rule out something from this event so let’s keep an eye on things throughout the day. If all goes well, the Sunshine Coast could see occasional 3ft sets by the end of the day, but I’m not going to hold my breath (and, chance of this swell making landfall decreases as you head south from here). If the swell does arrive, there will be extremely long breaks between the sets. 

Keep an eye on the comments below for updated information as it comes to hand. 

This weekend (May 5 - 6)

If we’re so lucky to see inconsistent new E’ly swell across the SE Qld region on Friday, it’ll probably hold into Saturday before easing into Sunday. Again, don't get your hopes up for this at all.

Otherwise, we’re looking at small residual swells across most coasts through Saturday. Unfortunately, a new ridge pushing across the coast looks like it’ll drive fresh southerly winds to most locations so only protected southern corners will have clean conditions.

The only other swell source is a deepening trough NE of New Zealand from tonight onwards that will develop a poorly-aligned S/SE fetch aimed up into New Caledonia. We'll see a small spread of swell from this source, probably arriving through Saturday afternoon and holding through Sunday and Monday, but only favouring SE Qld and Far Northern NSW coasts. Sets will be inconsistent, around 2-3ft tops. 

Saturday's coastal ridge will maintain strength across SE Qld into Sunday, keeping open beaches bumpy and generating only small levels of short range windswell. At this stage the weekend looks pretty average for most coasts - even if the new E'ly swells produce small waves across the outer Qld points, they'll be horribly inconsistent - not a great fit with frothing weekend crowds.

However, there is some promise for locations south of about Yamba on Sunday, where winds will be much lighter. A series of strong fronts pushing through Bass Strait on Friday and Saturday will generate an acute south swell that should light up south swell magnets south of Byron with 3ft sets on Sunday. Local winds will be an issue north from about Coffs, but everywhere south from here should see relatively clean conditions. However don’t expect much size at beaches without good southerly exposure, as the E'ly swells won't produce much size down here. 

Next week (May 7 onwards)

The models have cooled on the idea of a cut-off low in the Southern Tasman Sea later this weekend (pushing it quickly through to NZ), so surf potential early next week looks on the small side from this direction with several intermittent flushes of south swell originating from a strong Southern Ocean storm track. 

Of greater interest to SE Qld surfers is a rebuilding ridge through the lower Coral Sea that looks like building moderate trade swells across our region for much of the week - nothing overly special but plenty of fun waves for the outer points, as winds look like they’ll be moderate to fresh S thru’ SE. 

Let’s take a closer look in Friday’s updated forecast.