South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 14th September)

Best Days: Sun: small waves at outer SE Qld points in the afternoon. Bigger but wobbly at semi-exposed Northern NSW points. Mon: easing, improving surf as winds abate from the SW thru' S. Tues: small clean open beaches early. 

Recap: Small persistent swells out of the SE and E have maintained occasional 2ft sets at exposed beaches. Winds have been up from the north though early mornings have offered periods of clean conditions.

Small peaks at Burleigh this morning

Even a couple of baby waves at Noosa

This weekend (Sep 15 - 16)

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

Saturday looks very ordinary.

There’s no new swell on the way and winds will strengthen from the north, reaching 30kts across the Mid North Coast after lunch though it won’t be quite as strong north from Byron Bay through into SE Qld. Early morning should offer a period of light NW winds but with very inconsistent 1-2ft sets out of the east it’s not worth getting too excited about.

A vigorous southerly change will push across Southern NSW on Saturday, reaching Yamba a couple of hours before sunrise and then the Qld/NSW border between 7-8am. Saturday’s strong northerly winds will generate a brief spike of local NE windswell that will probably peak overnight and then ease rapidly through the early morning, but of more interest is a building S’ly windswell in the wake of the change. 

South facing beaches south of Byron should build to a choppy 4-6ft by the afternoon, though the low period and acute southerly direction will create significantly smaller surf at protected locations. The semi-exposed points will see windy waves but should push into the 3-4ft range after lunch. 

The only worthwhile options under this pattern will be the outer SE Qld points. They’ll see small levels of leftover NE windswell early Sunday morning, but by lunchtime we should see an upwards trend out of the south and by mid-late afternoon there should be occasional 2ft+ runners. It won’t be very high quality (short range south swells rarely are) but with exposed northern ends being larger and very wind affected, there won’t be many quality options on hand across any coast. Protected points will be tiny to flat owing to the swell direction and short wavelength. 

As such, keep your expectations low this weekend - and don’t bother with the early session on Sunday as it’ll really be at its best after lunch. 

Next week (Sep 17 onwards)

Monday looks like the pick of the forecast period at this stage.

Sunday’s S’ly swell will have peaked and will slowly ease throughout the day, but early morning should still be up into the 4-6ft range at south swell magnets south of Byron, and winds will back to a moderate to fresh SW’er before tending moderate S’ly throughout the day. 

Semi-exposed points will see smaller but more workable waves in the 3-4ft range (easing to 2-3ft throughout the day) and protected southern corners will be much smaller again.

Across SE Qld, expect size to ease from 3ft+ at the outer points to 1-2ft throughout the day. Exposed northern ends will be larger but still rather bumpy (3ft+ easing to 2ft+).

Light variable winds are then expected early Tuesday ahead of a redeveloping northerly flow into the afternoon, which will strengthen into Wednesday. The south swell will ease rapidly during this time, only favouring reliable south swell magnets south of Byron.

Looking further ahead, and the Southern Ocean storm track will largely steer away from our swell window throughout next week. There’s an interesting upper level system progged to enter the Tasman Sea around Wednesday that could spawn a local swell generating system (and some interesting surf possibilities for Thurs/Fri) but it’s way to early to have any confidence right now, as the models are quite divergent.

Otherwise, we’ll see small levels of E’ly swell all week from a modest trade flow developing north and north-east of New Zealand longitude at the moment. It’s expected to remain active into the start of next week, so we should see a slow building trend from about Tuesday onwards, from 1-2ft to perhaps 2-3ft+ by Thursday or Friday - but it’ll be very slow and inconsistent at best. Certainly not worth getting your hopes up about.

Have a great weekend!