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

Best Days: Most days should have fun waves. 

Recap: Easing SE swells from 3-4ft to 2-3ft on Tuesday were accompanied by early light winds and NE sea breeze. Today saw the swell direction trend more to the east, holding an inconsistent 2-3ft, and early light winds gave way to a moderate to fresh southerly breeze as a weak trough slid up the coast. 

This week (Feb 28 - Mar 1)

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Surf conditions will maintain small to moderate though inconsistent waves out of the east for the rest of the week. We'll also see a small south swell from a poorly aligned front in the lower Tasman Sea today.

The easterly swells will be sourced from an unfavourably aligned ridge in the northern Tasman Sea, whose main redeeming feature is its stationary nature - this should allow a decent spread of energy back into our region (though it’ll mainly favour the northern part of the state). The poor alignment isn't great for consistency though.

The wave models are having a hard time separating the individual swell trains, so the model guidance isn’t particularly clear for the short term, and I also think it’s undercalling wave heights: we should see 2-3ft sets both days, perhaps a few bigger waves out of the E/NE at times if we’re extremely lucky. 

The south swell is more likely to show Friday than Thursday, but will be marginally smaller in size, and will only appear at south facing beaches. 

Winds will remain variable, mainly onshore both days, but there shouldn’t be too much strength on offer so conditions should be quite workable both days. There are no major synoptic drivers for local winds, anyway.

This weekend (March 2 - 3)

The weekend looks pretty fun, with the Tasman high strengthening into Friday, building the ridge across its northern flank, which will continue to build sideband E/NE swells across Southern NSW. 

Surf size is expected to increase from an inconsistent 2-3ft to a more consistent 3-4ft as the weekend progresses, though estimating the timing of the building trend is hard as there won’t be a defined swell front. Again, expect inconsistent set waves due to the poor alignment of the source fetch. 

Also in the water (mainly Sunday) will be a small long period S’ly groundswell generated by a strong Southern Ocean frontal system well below the continent this week. No major size is likely from it though, just a few stray 2ft+ sets at south swell magnets. 

The main risk we have this weekend is a freshening N/NE breeze as the Tasman high muscles up. Again, no significant strength is likely but we will probably see bumpy conditions for some parts of the weekend. However the mornings are likely to see periods of light and variable winds, and thus lumpy surf conditions. 

Next week (Mar 4 onwards)

Tropical Cyclone Pola is currently E/SE of Fiji, and tracking southwards. It will become extra-tropical over the coming days, but concurrently broaden an E’ly wind field across its southern flank, also merging with the ridge in the Northern Tasman Sea.

The latest model guidance has slowed TC Pola down a little, which has increased its size potential - though delayed its arrival until overnight Sunday or early Monday.

As such, I’m now expecting a decent round of relatively long-lived E/NE groundswell building trough Monday, peaking late in the day or early Tuesday, and then slowly easing from Tuesday afternoon into Wednesday. At the height of the swell (late Monday) we should see strong 4-5ft+ sets across exposed beaches though there’ll be quite a wait for the bigger waves. Expect smaller surf either size of the peak, though it'll pack a similar punch for the entire duration.

At this stage winds are likely to be out of the north, though a trough to the south could bring about brief slack periods, or minor incursions of southerly winds. It’s too far out to have any confidence right now though.

Looking beyond this, and although TC Pola will exit our swell window over the weekend, a firm ridge through the Northern Tasman Sea will maintain plenty of user-friendly E/NE swell for the second half of next week. More on this in Friday’s update.