South Arm Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 25th October)

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Improving but easing surf Tues with lighter winds
• Very small but clean Wed
• Gusty winds from several directions Thurs and Fri
• Building local swell late Fri/Sat, though unlikely to have much quality
• Small new groundswells for next week

Recap

Tiny surf Saturday built a little into Sunday but was poor under gusty onshore winds. We've seen more size today but winds have remained onshore at the open beaches, and protected spots have been pretty small, below forecast expectations - though the Maria Island buoy (slightly outside of our swell window) recorded signficiant wave heights of 4.5m  from the same swell today, and maximum wave heights of nearly 8m.

This week (Oct 26 - 29)

There's not much to look forward to this week.

Easing winds will slowly improve surf conditions on Tuesday, but wave heights will also be abating so expect just small options across the South Arm swell magnets, maybe some 2ft sets.

Tiny surf and freshening offshore winds are expected Wednesday.

Our broad Southern Ocean swell window is under a blocking pattern at the moment, and so there's no new energy on the way for a little while. 

We do have some funky winds and weather ahead though, thanks to a series of cut-off lows sourced from a troughy region in the Bight, moving across the Tasmanian region. 

The first will bypass the coast (early Thursday), and probably not result in much surf thanks to the poor storm track, perpendicular through our swell window. 

We will however see gusty winds from almost every direction late Wednesday thru' Thursday, before the second cut-off low settles into a south-east tending southerly gale on Friday afternoon (see below).

This is quite a dynamic situation, and has the potential to deliver a short range S/SE swell event for the South Arm late Friday, but we'll need to take a closer look on Wednesday. 

This weekend (Oct 30 - 31)

Strong onshore winds associated with this cut-off low are likely to dominate the start of the weekend. However, all of our surf potential will be locally sourced - the broader swell window will have been inactive, so any surf we see will be short period and (likely) low in quality. 

At this stage it's too early to have confidence in the outlook, as minor changes in the position of the low could dramatically change the forecast.

Either way, whatever local energy we see Saturday will ease rapidly into Sunday with rapidly abating winds too.

So right now, I'd be cautious in your expectations for any surfing this weekend.

Next week (Nov 1 onwards)

The outlook for next week is a little better. 

A developing frontal stream through the Southern Ocean later this week should set up a modest groundswell for (about) Monday arvo or Tuesday, offering small waves through the South Arm.

A stronger sequence of follow up systems behind this are looking good for a better round of groundswell later next week and into the weekend. 

But, that's a long time away - let's see how things are looking Wednesday.