Sydney, Hunter and Illawarra Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 15th March)

Best Days: Sun: peaky SE swell with winds slowly backing to the SW. 

Recap: Small peaky surf in general with NE winds Thursday tending fresh SW thru’ S’ly today in the wake of a trough.

This weekend (Mar 16 - 17)

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*this week's Forecaster Notes will be occasionally brief and erratic, as Craig is on annual leave - to receive notification when they’re updated, please update your account preferences*

A coastal trough will linger about the region on Saturday, just north of Sydney, before moving south into Sunday, possibly forming a small low off the South Coast. 

A broad high pressure system over Tasmania will direct mainly moderate to fresh SE winds across most coasts on Saturday but as the the trough moves south into Sunday, we’ll see winds to veer more S’ly then SW. 

The ridge has been strengthened in the latest model runs with a decent fetch now expected to stretch right across the tasman Sea (see below) and we’re now looking at building SE swells through Saturday from 2-3ft to 3-4ft. Surf quality will be pretty bumpy but there’ll be options at most beaches, as this swell direction will offer a more uniform spread than southerly swells. 

Into Sunday, conditions will improve as the trough moves south and winds back to the south, then south-west, and surf size should maintain 3-4ft in the morning before easing to 2-3ft after lunch. it won’t be perfect but there should be some fun waves on offer. 

Next week (Mar 18 onwards)

A broad lingering trough adjacent the entire East Coast next week - occupying the western third of the Tasman Sea - will result in small surf conditions as the weekend’s source moves south, outside of our swell window. We will hwoever see an extended period of light winds locally.

An E’ly tending NE infeed into the broad Tasman trough (across the NE Tasman, and north of New Zealand) will generate small background E/NE swells all week but I doubt we’ll see much more than a lazy 2ft+ at most beaches. There'll be periods of smaller waves at times too.

A deepening tropical low further to the east - well SE of Samoa - will form into a nice mid-latitude system early next week but it looks like this will occur inside the NZ swell shadow. As such I’m not expecting a lot of energy from this source (later next week and into the weekend). It’s also a long distance from the mainland so any swell that does reach the East Coast will be small and inconsistent anyway. 

Otherwise, there’s nothing of any significant standing out in the long term at this stage. Let’s see how Monday’s model runs are stacking up.