South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 8th May)

Best Days: Thurs: light winds but rapidly easing S'ly swell, and a small residual E'ly swell. Keep an eye out for small sneaky sets south from Byron from a long range S/SE pulse, holding thru' Fri. Sat onwards: windy but waves at most coasts. 

Recap: A strong S/SE swell built across the East Coast on Tuesday, up to 6-8ft in Southern NSW, but we saw smaller surf in Northern NSW building to 4-6ft at south facing beaches with much less size in SE Qld due the direction, 1-2ft across most beaches and 3ft at south swell magnets. This size range persisted into Wednesday morning but has eased this afternoon. Both days saw lovely morning conditions with offshore winds ahead of afternoon sea breezes. 

This week (May 9 - 10)

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We’re looking at a return to small surf for the next few days. 

Most beaches will see a minor undercurrent of residual E’ly swell, somewhere between 1-2ft and very inconsistent, generated by modest activity in the South Pacific late last week and over the weekend.

South facing beaches in Northern NSW will pick up a small S’ly swell on Thursday afternoon, but unfortunately, the latest model runs have narrowed the width of the responsible fetch - a post-frontal W/SW flow exiting eastern Bass Strait - and also tweaked its direction a little more zonally, away from our swell window. This has downgraded its potential size.

In any case, only south swell magnets were only meant to see any size from this energy anyway, and they’ll remain your best option with occasional 2ft+ sets filling in around lunchtime through the afternoon across the Lower Mid North Coast, extending to the Northern Rivers very late in the day. Keep your expectations low - this will be a brief flush of flukey energy and it’ll be gone by Friday morning too. 

As a side note, both days may see a small, extremely inconsistent undercurrent of long period S/SE swell, generated by intense polar low pressure systems well to the S and SE of New Zealand over the weekend and earlier this week (mentioned in Friday’s notes but inadvertently omitted on Monday because of Tuesday’s distracting swell event!).

Despite the nice figures on the swell forecast data - suggesting 4ft sets - I don’t think we’ll see a lot of energy either day, just the odd 2ft+ wave glancing reliable south swell magnets, with breaks of twenty of thirty minutes between sets. It’s worth keeping a watch out for, but not worth planning any surf time around.

This swell won’t really show north of Byron either. So expect very little southerly swell across SE Qld over the coming days.

As for conditions, Thursday is the pick with light variable winds in all areas. An approaching front will freshening N’ly tending NW winds on Friday so there’s a risk that some coasts will be side shore for a period of time (earlier in the south, later in the north) but with a small swell outlook it’s not worth getting worried about.

This weekend (May 11 - 12)

OK, there’s a lot to unpack for the weekend. 

A strong front will cross the coast Friday night (see chart below), and we’ll see winds swing from a fresh, gusty W/SW early Saturday morning to a S’ly by the afternoon, and then gusty SE by Sunday afternoon as a strong ridge firms along the coast. Sunday morning may see isolated pockets of SW winds but I’m not totally confident on this, as the synoptic flow will be quite vigorous and may override land effects.

As for surf, SE Qld will pick up a small trade swell both days from a small E’ly fetch developing south of New Caledonia on Friday, being the result of the interaction between a Tasman high and a developing tropical system in the northern Coral Sea. 

No major size is likely, but the Sunshine Coast should see slow 2ft, almost 2-3ft sets from this source both days, with slightly smaller surf as you track south from the Gold Coast. 

The tropical system in the Coral Sea still stands an outside chance to form into a depression or a tropical cyclone; nevertheless we’re looking at only small, short lived pulse of NE swell from its early developments on Thursday and Friday. This should glance the SE Qld region on Saturday afternoon and Sunday, and we may pick up some 2-3ft sets across north-facing beaches on the Gold and Sunshine Coasts. Again, it’ll be slow and inconsistent.

Strong S/SE winds feeding into the Coral Sea should also kick up some short range S/SE swell north from Ballina into the Gold and Sunshine Coasts over the weekend. Quality will be low, but the mix of swells may provide something rideable if you can find a location out of the wind.

There’s also a more significant swell source to our south this weekend, however it’ll mainly affect Northern NSW. 

An intense Tasman Low is expected to form off the South Coast on Saturday morning, driving southerly gales into the region and generating a large local swell that should push into Northern NSW into the afternoon, with south facing beaches south of Byron reaching 6ft+ very late in the day (it’ll arrive much later in the Far North, than the Mid North Coast).

The initial direction looks poor for SE Qld too so don’t expect much size from this on Saturday.

Additionally, the low will rapidly clear to the east during the day, so the short-lived nature of the responsible fetch means we’ll see a rapid drop in size during Sunday - initially 6ft+ at south facing beaches south of Byron early on, but much smaller elsewhere, and likely to halve during the day. 

Exposed spots will be wind affected anyway so you’ll have to tuck into a sheltered southern corners. SE Qld should pick up slow, inconsistent 2ft sets across the outer points, with wind affected 3ft+ sets at exposed northern ends. 
 
Let’s take a closer look on Friday. 

Next week (May 13 onwards)

A series of strong Southern Ocean fronts will maintain a healthy regime of southerly groundswell for Northern NSW through next week, though no major size is expected at this stage. 

A broad E/SE fetch developing way out in the South Pacific below Tahiti over the weekend (see chart above) will eventually supply some small E'ly swell to our coast later in the week - but it'll only useful in the event our swell window becomes completely inactive around the same time.

More interestingly for us is the weekend’s strong ridge through the Coral Sea, which is expected to lengthen into the south-western Pacific Ocean, generating good E/SE swells for the first half of next week. However, local winds are likely to remain a concern (somewhere from the S thru’ SE, or even E/SE) and therefore best suited to the SE Qld and Far Northern NSW points. 

More on this in Friday’s update.