Sydney, Hunter and Illawarra Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday 3rd January)

Best Days: Most days will have OK waves, though a little wind affected at times. A flukey S'ly groundswell Mon/Tues has the potential to surprise with solid waves, though it'll be erratic in coverage.  

Recap: Thursday delivered a mix of swells, with the dominant E/NE energy coming up just under forecast expectations - we had some reports of 3-4ft sets across the South Coast, but most open beaches saw 3ft sets, and there was a small short range S/SE swell in the mix too, from the tail end of Wednesday’s late change. Winds remained light to moderate from the S/SE tending SE so conditions were OK. Today has maintained 3ft sets out of the E/NE, with similarly light winds, early SW and now around to the E.

This weekend (Jan 4-5)

No change to the weekend forecast.

We’ve got a gusty S’ly change on the way, due to reach Sydney overnight Saturday. Ahead of the change, N/NE winds will freshen from this evening onwards, generating a peaky NE windswell for the first half of the weekend.

Surf size should slowly build into the 2-3ft range at NE facing beaches, though quality will be patchy under the accompanying side-shore breeze. There'll be some small leftover E/NE swell from today in the mix too. 

Saturday night's S’ly change will disrupt the N/NE flow but it should persist just long enough to maintain 2ft+ sets early Sunday morning before size fades to 1ft through the day. 

We’ll concurrently see a building S’ly windswell in the lee of the change on Sunday, with size likely to increase from 2-3ft to 3-4ft as the day wears on. Unfortunately, those beaches picking up the most size will be quite wind affected so you’ll have to find a compromise between size and quality. 

There’s a slim chance for pockets of early SW winds early morning, though most locations will swing S’ly during the day, and then S/SE into the afternoon.

Next week (Jan 6 onwards)

The impressive mid-latitude low I was discussing all last week is still looking, well, impressive. 

It’s expected to ‘bomb’ over the weekend (meaning a central pressure drop of more than 24hPa in 24 hours) but the core fetch will be aimed outside of our swell window (see below).

The low will pass across our Great Circle paths whilst on a steady E/SE trajectory, which isn’t favourable for swell production - but by this time there’ll be a long, broad expanse of SW winds that should generate some flukey south swell for our region.

Initially, Monday is looking to see 3ft+ of peaky leftover short range SE swell, originating from the bottom of a trough, related to Saturday night’s southerly change, which is expected to to stall across the Mid North Coast on Sunday. This trough will direct E’ly winds across the coast Monday, turning NE into Tuesday as the trough dissipates and a high moves into the Tasman Sea, but speeds shouldn’t be too strong and there’ll be pockets of light varibale winds here and there. 

Estimating surf size from the associated S’ly groundswell is tricky, because the energy will probably just glance the coast, and not affect many locations at all. So, expect a wide range in size between very little (or more accurately, a greater influence of short range SE swell on Monday), and up between 3ft to almost 5ft at south swell magnets - with the upper end of this size range across the Hunter coast.

There’ll be a couple of swells pushing through at various times between Sunday night and Tuesday night, with late Mon/early Tues looking the most promising at this stage. But, keep your expectations low, as it’s not a high confidence event. 

Looking further ahead, and we’ll see easing S’ly swells from Wednesday onwards. The only other swell source standing out right now is a modest, stationary N/NE fetch off the Mid North Coast that’ll maintain small NE windswells through the second half of the week and next weekend. No major size is expected though. 

There are also some suggestions for a significant Tasman Low the following week but this is a long time away so I wouldn’t put too much planning time around it yet. However it’ll be one to watch during next week’s notes. 

Have a great weekend, see you Monday!