Southern Tasmania Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Friday 24th March)

Best Days: Every day over the coming period besides Tuesday morning

Recap

Good sized sets yesterday morning and decent conditions with a variable breeze. Today the swell was hanging in at 2ft with a reinforcing SW swell along with light offshore winds.

This weekend and week (Mar 25 - 31)

Over the coming weekend we should see small pulses of SW swell from persistent pre-frontal W/NW fetches along the polar shelf.

Clifton should hang around 1-2ft with N/NW offshores tomorrow morning, likely persisting into the afternoon and then variable tending SE winds Sunday.

A fun new S/SW groundswell is due on Monday morning, generated by a tight but intense polar low forming south-west of us.

This swell may be seen later Sunday but should peak Monday morning to 2ft to possibly 3ft along with offshore N'ly tending NW winds.

A low point in swell activity is due Tuesday morning but from the afternoon we'll see some new W/SW groundswell energy filling in, more so Wednesday.

As touched on last update, a strong node of the Long Wave Trough is forecast to move in from the west, stalling just east of the Bight.

This isn't ideal for us as all the storm activity will be very zonal and the resultant swells west in nature.

Still, we'll see a vast and very strong fetch of severe-gale to storm-force W/SW-W winds generated from south of us, all the way over to the south-east Indian Ocean. The strongest and best aligned stage of this fetch is expected Monday evening and Tuesday just south-west of us, and this will result in the largest increase in W/SW groundswell Wednesday morning.

A late increase to 2ft is due Tuesday under NW offshore winds, with a peak Wednesday morning. We should see Clifton coming in at 3ft with 4ft sets more than likely, easing through the afternoon.

Thursday will see more distant W/SW groundswell energy filling in with less consistency, generated by the fetch in the south-east Indian Ocean. Inconsistent 2-3ft sets should persist across Clifton but with morning offshores ahead of a W/SW change.

Easing surf is then due into Friday, but we may see another large swell for next weekend. We'll have another look at this Monday though. Have a great weekend!