Western Australia Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday 25th October)

Best Days: No good days until later Sunday and more so Monday morning

Recap

A slight uptick in swell yesterday though with less than ideal S'ly winds across the South West, a bit cleaner to the north but tiny.

Today the swell eased back a touch and conditions were poor across all locations with onshore winds.

This week and weekend (Oct 26 – 29)

We're falling under the effects of increased storm and frontal activity as a strengthening node of the Long Wave Trough moves in from the west, further across through the Bight over the weekend.

What we'll see is front after front directed up towards us and then through the Bight, getting stronger with each succession.

The first significant system is currently between us and Heard Island, generating a broad fetch of strong W/SW winds towards us, pushing up and into us in a weaker form Thursday afternoon.

This will generate an initial increase in mid-period W/SW swell for later tomorrow, peaking Friday morning. Margs looks small and windswelly through the morning, increasing to 5-6ft later in the day, while Perth and Mandurah will be tiny, building late to a messy 2ft. Winds will be poor and fresh to strong from the W/NW tending W/SW.

The swell is expected to peak through Friday to 6-8ft in the South West and 2-3ft in Mandurah, 2ft to occasionally 3ft around Perth as onshore winds persist from the W/SW tending W.

A secondary slightly stronger but shorter-lived front will fire up on the back of the first front, producing a burst of gale to severe-gale W/SW winds through our southern swell window.

This should produce a slightly stronger S/SW groundswell for Saturday morning, coming in around 6-8ft again but with more power around Margs, while Perth looks to ease back from 2ft with 2ft+ waves around Mandurah. Strengthening W'ly winds will create poor conditions across all locations and this will be related to the strongest storm of all.

A very deep and intense low is forecast to form south-west of us Friday afternoon.

We're expected to see an initial fetch of severe-gale W/SW winds, followed by an impressive fetch of storm-force winds generated initially in our south-western swell window, but more so southern as the low pushes east.

These winds acting on an already active sea state are due to produce an oversized SW tending S/SW groundswell for Sunday, building rapidly through the morning ahead of a peak during the afternoon.

The South West should build to 12-15ft across exposed breaks, with 3ft sets around Mandurah and 2-3ft waves up in Perth though winds will remain onshore form the SW, easing later out of the S/SW.

Monday is looking much cleaner as the swell eases with a light morning offshore and afternoon sea breezes. We'll have a closer look at this Friday.

A secondary strong low may generate another good large SW groundswell for Tuesday afternoon/Wednesday, but again we'll look at this in more detail Friday.