Sydney, Hunter and Illawarra Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 27th August)

Best Days: Thurs/Fri: Solid E'ly tending SE swell, but with dicey winds. Sat/Sun: strong rebuilding SE swell with rapidly improving conditions. Sun is the pick of the forecast period. Mon: easing surf with offshore winds. 

Recap: Winds remained light for most of Tuesday - against forecast expectations - as an expected E/NE swell built across the coast. We’ve seen strong S/SE winds today with a further building E/NE swell that’s now hovering around the 6ft mark at open beaches. However conditions are pretty poor away from protected southern corners. 

This week (Aug 28-29)

There’s no shortage of surf on tap for the rest of the working week. A broad low pressure system in the Northern Tasman Sea is slowly tracking southwards, and a healthy easterly fetch between it and a large high pressure system to the south is expected to remain in position for several days. This will enhance the pre-existing sea state and generate a slightly stronger pulse of E’ly swell through Thursday that’s likely to reach 6ft to maybe even 8ft at some exposed beaches (obviously, smaller at sheltered spots). 

However, gusty S/SE winds will confine the only rideable options to protected southern corners. There’s an outside chance for a few localised periods of lighter SW winds early morning but in general the synoptic flow is expected to overide any topographical influences (even if we see a brief SW flow, there’ll still be plenty of lumpiness on top from today’s winds).

Thursday’s swell will then settle back into Friday, easing a smidge and starting to veer more to the south-east as the swell source slips south of Sydney’s latitude.

In fact, we’re expecting the low to retrograde westward during Friday, pushing up towards the southern NSW coast which will increase the pressure gradient and in turn strengthen a southerly airstream about the coastal margin. As such, protected southern corners are looking like being your only option on Friday with around 6ft or so at exposed beaches.

It’s worth reiterating again that winds will be lighter on the South Coast (south of about Wollongong), with a greater chance for a slightly longer period of SW winds early morning too. As the South Coast should see an equal amount of swell as per the Sydney region, if you have some flexi time up your sleeve it’ll be worth a road trip.

This weekend (Aug 30-31)

We’re now a little closer to the weekend, and the models are starting to take shape with what’s in store surf wise. And the good news is that yet another strong SE swell is expected to arrive through Saturday, generated by the retrograding low across the southern Tasman Sea on Friday. This is expected to increase surf size back up into the 6-8ft range during the day - probably not in the water at first light, but showing strongly through mid-late morning and further into the afternoon.

The only downside with Saturday will be the presence of locally gusty S’ly winds, as the low starts to track northwards then north-east away from the coast. There is a good chance that most locations will see early sou’westers - moderate to fresh at times - but they are likely to swing back to the south by late morning. This will again confine the best waves to sheltered southern corners. 

Saturday’s pulse of new SE swell should persist into Sunday morning before trending downwards throughout the day. Early morning should still have some 6ft+ sets at exposed beaches and even better are the local winds - we’ll be under a relaxed pressure gradient so light W’ly breezes are expected for the entire morning, before tending light and variable into the afternoon as wave heights start to taper off. Let’s fine tune the details on Friday.

Longer term (Sep 1 onwards)

Steadily easing swells and moderate offshore winds are expected on Monday as this event clears our swell window. Looking further ahead, and an amplifying Long Wave Trough across the south-eastern corner of the country early next week is expected to drive a series of cold fronts across the southern NSW coast, resulting in a sharp increase in short range southerly swell through Tuesday, Wednesday and maybe even Thursday - although it’s likely to be wind affected at times. Let’s take a closer look on Friday.