Southern Tasmania Forecast (issued Friday 2nd May)

Best Days: Sunday in protected spots, Monday morning, Tuesday in protected spots

Recap

Yesterday was tiny with a leftover easing swell from Wednesday, while this morning remained slow, but a new swell should of lifted wave heights slightly this afternoon. Conditions were good right up until a couple of hours ago, and now an onshore change that's moved in will dominate the rest of the weekend.

This weekend and Monday (May 3 - 5)

Unfortunately the size from the deepening Tasman Low off our East Coast has been downgraded with the system expected to sit just a touch too east, with the strongest winds sitting just out our swell window.

Instead we're looking a stormy and low quality 3ft+ or so of S/SE windswell through tomorrow and 3-4ft or so on Sunday across Clifton.

Winds tomorrow will be poor and strong from the S/SE-S but come Sunday we should see cleaner conditions at protected breaks down the South Arm with a S/SW tending SW breeze as the low starts moving off to the east.

Come Monday the S/SE swell is expected to drop rapidly, but early there should be a few 2ft+ sets across Clifton, with more size at more exposed locations. Winds should swing NW creating clean conditions ahead of a W/SW change.

Tuesday onwards (May 6 onwards)

A secondary pulse of large and stormy SW swell mentioned last update is still on the cards for Tuesday.

This is forecast to be generated by a relatively weak front pushing in from the west, deepening significantly into a intense low and directing a fetch of gale to severe-gale SW winds up into us Monday evening (pictured right).

Size wise we should see a peak in the 4-6ft range Tuesday morning as winds swing from a possible early W'ly ahead of a S/SW change.

Into Wednesday the swell will back off but we may see some new S'ly swell developing as the low stalls and then starts pushing north up the Southern NSW Coast. This will be with unfavourable S/SW winds again, but we'll review this again on Monday.

Beyond Tuesday and Wednesday's swells there's a chance for some more SW swell into the end of the week, but check back here on Monday for the latest update.