South-east Queensland and Northern NSW Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 31st July)

Best Days: Stacks of south swell for the entire period, with periods of large waves across Northern NSW at times. Best conditions expected Saturday through early next week as winds becomg light. SE Qld looking best early next week as the southern storm track shifts a little more favourably to the eastern Tasman.

Recap: Tuesday still offered a few super fun leftover E'ly sets around 2-3ft+ across some exposed beaches, under a morning offshore breeze. A S’ly change pushed across the coast during the day, bumping up most locations, and this airstream has persisted today (with pockets of morning offshores). Building southerly swells have mainly favoured south facing beaches south of Byron, with a small residual E’ly swell occupying SE Qld and Far Northern NSW. 

This week (August 1 - 2)

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So, it’s all southerly swell for the foreseeable future. Lots of it, too, and sizeable. 

A new pulse of south swell will push across Northern NSW overnight, originating from another intensification of the primary low that generated today’s increase, well SW of New Zealand yesterday. 

This should maintain 4-6ft sets at most south facing beaches south of Byron for Thursday, though conditions will be wobbly at exposed spots under a moderate southerly breeze. Protected southern ends and points will be your best option. 

This swell will be marginally better positioned for SE Qld (than this afternoon’s) but with the southerly airstream in place, only protected points will be clean and they’ll be small and slow - perhaps the odd 2ft set if we’re really lucky, but extremely inconsistent and sometimes just one or two waves at a time. Exposed northern ends will be larger but much more wind affected. 

Friday will generally see a slow decline in surf size from Thursday, with persistent moderate southerly winds (isolated pockets of early sou’westers here and there). 

However, surfers across the Mid North Coast should keep a watch out for a late pulse of large long period swell, generated by a fast moving front through the lower Tasman Sea late tonight and early Thursday (see below).

This system was mentioned in Wednesday’s notes, however the latest model guidance has majorly upgraded the strength of this low - core winds are likely to reach 60-70kts (see below) - so the leading edge has been brought forward and the entire episode has received a size upgrade too.

Peak swell periods from this pulse are likely to reach 21-22 seconds, however we’ll mainly see these figures across wave buoys in the far north (i.e. SE Qld, and probably overnight Friday), as each location’s proximity to the swell source will result in lower periods (the swell energy will be still ‘growing’ across the Mid North Coast). Still, don't be surprised to see Tp values in the 18-20 second range between Crowdy Head and the Tweed Coast. 

The low will be poorly aimed for our region, so we’re looking at a much smaller spread of energy across Northern NSW, compared to coasts in the direct firing line (hello, West Coast New Zealand!), but I wouldn’t be surprised if south swell magnets south of Coffs saw late sets pushing north of 6ft+ right on dark. 

This weekend (August 3 - 4)

Friday’s late arrival of long period S’ly swell will peak overnight and then trend down through Saturday, though early morning should still some some solid sets north of 6ft+ at south facing beaches south of Byron (smaller elsewhere). 

Had the storm track been better aligned in our swell window, and the low been expected to move a little more slowly, I’d have added another couple of feet to this estimate. Of course, expect much smaller surf at beaches with less southerly exposure.

There’ll also be some underlying long range energy from the polar component to the low responsible for Friday’s pulse; this should keep south facing beaches humming all day. 

I don’t like this weather system for SE Qld surf prospects, so away from the region's exposed northern ends and south facing beaches - which could pick up 3-4ft sets - I think most Gold Coast beaches and outer points will see only slow, very inconsistent waves around 1-2ft+, and it’ll be a little smaller across the Sunny Coast. 

Light variable winds are expected all day Saturday so conditions should be clean just about everywhere.

Saturday afternoon’s easing trend will continue into Sunday morning, but the afternoon is still on track for another round of solid long period swell from yet another sequence of powerful Southern Ocean low pressure systems.

However, the storm track - whilst still very broad and strong - is now modelled to be positioned a little further to the east, which will reduce our size prospects a little, compared to Wednesday’s estimates. That being said, we’re still looking at a long spell of large long period south swell for the entire East Coast.

At this stage we’ll see building size during the day, from 3-5ft at south facing beaches south of Byron in the morning, up to 6-8ft+ by late afternoon (more likely across the Mid North Coast than the Far North Coast, due to the late arrival time further north).

In fact, SE Qld could very well dip for a proper size increase before sunset, because the leading edge isn’t expected into the region until mid-late afternoon, and the associated kick in size may be lagging a little behind this. As such, expect small leftover S’ly swell north of the border for most of the day. I’ll refine the timing in Friday’s update. 

Nevertheless, light winds are expected all day under a weak ridge of high pressure, so everywhere will be clean. 

Next week (August 5 onwards)

For my money, the best sequence in this entire progression is expected to occur overnight Saturday and into Sunday morning, with a secondary polar low firing up at the tail end of an existing long, broad and very strong fetch pushing from polar latitudes up into the central Tasman Sea (see below).

This will be working on a very active sea state generate by previous incarnations of the same parent system, and this should generate more large long period southerly swell that’ll keep wave heights elevated through Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

At this stage it’s a little hard to slice and dice the precise size trend, so I’ll just aim for an extended period in the 4-6ft range at south facing beaches (south of Byron), though I think we’ll see one of those days - probably Tuesday - push north of 6-8ft at times, and there'll be bigger options at offshore bombies and reliable south swell magnets.

The good news for SE Qld surfers is that this storm track position is better positioned, so whilst we’ll see less size than Northern NSE, the outer points should pick up plenty of waves in the 2-3ft+ range through time time frame, with later Tuesday likely to see a peak around 4ft+. 

Exposed northern ends and south swell magnets north of the border will be a couple of feet higher too. 

No major synoptic wind is expected through this time frame so we should see plenty of good opportunities for clean conditions. Light winds are expected throughout with clean conditions.

See you Friday!