Sydney Hunter Illawarra Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday July 29th)

Best Days: Every day for the experienced

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Large S'ly swell building today, easing tomorrow
• Reinforcing large S/SE swell tomorrow
• Oversized S/SE-SE groundswell Wed, easing slowly Thu, more noticeably into Fri
• Strong S/SW winds, tending SW for a period each morning
• Easing mid-period S/SE-SE swell Sat, with a mod-large E'ly swell for Sat/Sun
• Slowly easing E swell next week
• W/SW tending weak sea breezey Sat, W/NW tending E/NE Sun

Recap

The weekend was tiny to flat ahead of a building trend in S’ly swell late yesterday as a vigorous frontal system pushed offshore.

Today we’ve got a rapid increase in large S’ly swells thanks to gale-force S/SW winds being projected north up the coast. This morning was in the 6ft range but the swell has since kicked to 8-10ft with more on the way.

This week and weekend (Jul 30 - Aug 4)

These notes will be brief today as Steve covers the Olympic surfing event.

Buckle up, we’re in for one of the more sustained runs of large, windy surf in recent memory thanks to a significant, broad low pressure system dominating the Tasman Sea.

The low will go through multiple phases over the coming days, with the first phase being gale-force S/SW-S winds projected up the southern NSW coast last night and today.

As the low broadens and matures today, we’ll see an additional fetch of S/SE gales extending from Australia down towards New Zealand, reaching severe-gale strength off the southern tip this afternoon/evening.

This early phase should result in a strong, large surge of S’ly swell as we’re seeing today, backing off into tomorrow morning as S/SE energy starts to take over. Expect wave heights ebbing and pulsing between 8-10ft tomorrow on the south magnets.

Come Wednesday, the fetch of severe-gales off the southern tip of New Zealand surging slightly towards us should generate an XL pulse of S/SE-SE groundswell. Strong 12ft+ surf is due through Wednesday, with bigger waves on the deepwater bommies.

The swell signature will be different to today's waves: the period will have drawn out and the direction will rotate towards southeast, each of which will allow more swell to breach southern corners.

Thursday morning should still come in at 10-12ft only easing slowly thanks to the sustained nature of the gales through the Tasman Sea.

It won’t be until Wednesday that the low starts to weaken and move north, and with this we’ll see the swell slowly drop away in size and period through Friday, likely still 8ft+ across the magnets but easing.

Into the weekend the S/SE-SE swell energy should continue to ease from 6ft+ range, while some new E/SE energy is due to take its place through Saturday/Sunday and into early next week, thanks to a great, broad fetch of strong to near gale-force E/SE winds projecting off New Zealand’s North Island.

At this stage 4-6ft surf is likely, easing into early next week but we’ll review this Wednesday.

Coming back to the local winds and this week will see strong S/SW-S winds in general, tending SW for a period across selected locations each morning this week.

Winds should start to ease Friday, but still follow the general SW-S pattern, possibly a bit better and W/SW on the Northern Beaches early.

Come the weekend, lighter W/SW winds should kick in across all locations ahead of weak sea breezes, with W/NW tending E/NE winds into Sunday.

All in all an incredible outlook of sizey swell for the experienced.