South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 19th June)

Best Days: Most days will have plenty of S'ly swell (only small in SE Qld) with some E/SE thru' SE swell lingering Thurs/Fri. Mainly S'ly winds will confine the best waves to sheltered spots. Early Friday looks like seeing offshores though.

Recap: Tuesday saw building E’ly swells across the region (tending E/SE thru’ SE in the north), though it took some time to get going in SE Qld where wave heights were much smaller than Northern NSW (and in particular the Mid North Coast). Wave heights were very close to forecast today - 4ft across Northern NSW (though interestingly, the Northern Rivers was a similar size as per the Mid North Coast), with SE Qld seeing 2ft+ runners on the outer points and bigger waves across south facing beaches (smaller on the Sunny Coast though). However, it’s worth noting that the swell was stronger and more defined than I anticipated. Winds were offshore for most of Tuesday and this morning, but have veered fresh southerly this afternoon.

Superbank lines this afternoon

Solid set at D'Bah

Fun lines at The Pass

Low tide rock runners at Caloundra

This week (June 20 - 21)

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So, the fetch that generated our current E/SE swell is slowly abating across the central eastern Tasman Sea. This means we’ll see a gradual easing of energy into Thursday and Friday, occasionally 3ft Thursday easing to 2-3ft Friday and becoming smaller, and the consistency will ease as well.

Surf size will be smaller throughout SE Qld, 1-2ft across the outer points and 2-3ft at exposed northern ends on Thursday, smaller on Friday.

But, that’s not the only swell expected to be in the water over the coming days. 

A modest fetch trailing today’s change will kick up some small short range S’ly swell for Northern NSW on Thursday. However, since Monday, the models have made some major changes in the structure of the associated low. They’ve since stalled it off the east coast of Tasmania, and ramped up surface wind speeds, generating a strong S'ly swell that’ll nose into the lower Mid North Coast on Thursday afternoon, probably just reaching Coffs Harbour or perhaps Yamba by close of business. 

This swell will be very south in direction so only reliable south swell magnets south of Byron will see the most size, up to 4-5ft+ late Thursday (in the south) or early Friday (in the north) but much smaller elsewhere, including SE Qld where we won’t see a great deal of size away from exposed northern ends - maybe just some slow 1-2ft waves at outer points early Friday, up to 2-3ft at south swell magnets. 

Size should throttle back a bit during the day across all regions - earlier in the south, than in the north.

As for Friday’s conditions, we should see early offshore winds ahead of a redeveloping S’ly breeze throughout the day as a change moves up the coast. This will affect southern locations first, but there should be a decent window of opportunity everywhere around dawn. 
 
This weekend (June 22 - 23)

We’ve got a weekend with fresh southerly winds across all regions thanks to a ridge of high pressure. We should see isolated pockets of early SW winds but they’ll be the exception rather than the norm.

As for surf, there’l be a mix of southerly energy in the water: some mid-range swell from Friday’s strengthening breeze, plus some longer period S/SE energy from Thursday’s re-intensification of the southern Tasman Low off the SW tip of New Zealand.

The models are pushing 4-6ft for Saturday (south facing beaches in Northern NSW) but I reckon this is slightly overcooked, I feel it’ll be smaller around 3-5ft at south facing beaches (smaller elsewhere) and with fresh southerlies conditions won’t be great. The E’ly swell of the previous days will be much smaller too so protected southern corners won’t have a lot of size. 

North of the border we’ll see small waves across the outer SE Qld points around 1-2ft, with bigger (though very wind affected) 3ft+ surf at exposed northern ends. Expect slightly smaller surf on the Sunshine Coast. 

A gradual easing of winds are likely Sunday though conditions won’t improve to any great degree. Expect similar wave heights as per Saturday across all coasts. 

Next week (June 24 onwards)

The models are meandering the southern Tasman Low slowly to the north over the weekend, which suggests an extended run of moderate, S/SE tending SE and maybe E/SE swell for much of next week, anywhere between 3-5ft at exposed coasts south from Byron, a little smaller north into SE Qld, with ideal conditions for the points under a moderate southerly quadrant breeze.

Well worth keeping the diary flexible for. More in Friday’s update.