Southern Tasmanian Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday April 10th)

Best Days: Every day this period besides Tuesday

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Large SW groundswell building today, peaking overnight, still large and easing from the S/SW tomorrow
• Moderate W-W/SW winds tomorrow AM, tending variable then W/SW again later
• Moderate + sized, reinforcing S/SW swell for Fri with NW-N/NW tending W/NW winds
• Easing surf Sat AM with W/NW tending SW winds
• Moderate sized S/SW swell for later Sat and Sun AM with NW-N/NW tending variable winds
• Easing swell Mon with N/NW tending variable winds
• Moderate sized SW swell later Mon but more so Tue with gusty S/SW winds

Recap

The swell was small and slow yesterday morning but with clean conditions, while today we've seen a steady increase in large groundswell, coming in at 2ft this morning but now pushing to 4-5ft. The surf should reach 4-6ft later today before peaking overnight and easing tomorrow.

Swell on the build today

This week and next (Apr 11 - 19)

Looking at the period ahead, and a strong, stalling node of the Long Wave Trough just east of us will focus incoming polar fronts up and towards us while strengthening, with today's large, building SW groundswell being the first falling under it's influence.

We should see the swell peaking overnight but still coming in large tomorrow morning, easing back from 4-6ft across Clifton.

Friday will see a reinforcing mid-period S/SW swell maintaining 4ft sets, generated by a trailing fetch of SW gales on the backside of the polar low, to our south-southwest today.

Winds aren't great tomorrow morning but should be moderate from the W-W/SW, tending variable ahead of late W/SW winds again.

Friday looks the best with a NW-N/NW offshore, shifting W/NW into the afternoon.

Saturday morning looks temporarily smaller and back to the 3ft+ range under W/NW tending W/SW winds.

Through the day, a good pulse of reinforcing mid-period S/SW swell is due, generated by patchy fetches of strong to gale-force W/SW winds moving along the polar shelf over the coming days.

It should produce a boost in energy, likely to 3-4ft across Clifton through the day, easing from a similar size Sunday morning under NW-N/NW tending W/NW winds.

Monday will start smaller, but a strong pulse of mid-period SW swell is likely later in the day, though peaking Tuesday.

The source will be a strong, broad polar low forming south of Western Australia on Sunday, with a broad fetch of gale-force W/SW winds due to be projected slowly east through early next week.

This should produce a moderate sized pulse of SW swell in the 4ft range on the sets across Clifton but with what looks to be SW-S/SW winds as the swell generating low clips the state. More in this Friday.