Western Australia Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday 17th February)

Best Days: Every morning this week across the South West, tomorrow and Wed AM to the north

Recap

An OK wave early Saturday across the swell magnets before winds shifted onshore, poor into Sunday.

Today our large SW groundswell has filled in right on cue with pumping and large waves across the South West to 8-10ft and 3-4ft in Mandurah, building to 2-3ft across Perth.

This week and weekend (Feb 18 - 21)

Today's large and powerful SW groundswell is peaking and we'll see it easing over the coming days but with good though blowy strong E/SE offshore winds tomorrow morning, easing late morning ahead of sea breezes.

The South West should ease from 6-8ft, 2-3ft in Mandurah and Perth. Wednesday looks great with a fresh offshore E/SE breeze, giving into sea breezes as the swell eases further, smaller Thursday as winds tend back to the E/SE-SE.

The easing trend looks to steady Friday with a small background SW groundswell keeping the South West topped up with 3-4ft sets on the magnets, tiny to the north. An offshore E'ly wind looks to create great conditions ahead of sea breezes, topping off a great week of waves.

As touched on last update, a good new SW groundswell is due on the weekend, generated by a broad polar low firing up around the Heard Island region mid-week.

The low will be poorly structured as shown in the image, with a fetch of severe-gale W/NW winds followed by a weaker fetch of trailing W/SW gales. This will hold back the size potential a little, but we'll still see a moderate to large sized SW groundswell building later Saturday but peaking Sunday around the 6ft range across the South West, 2ft+ in Mandurah and 2ft on the sets in Perth.

Winds are still tricky to forecast with a small surface low moving in from the west not being picked up by the models too well. So with this it's hard to make a call on conditions. Check back Wednesday for a clearer idea.

Following this we're likely to see some fun follow up S/SW swell, but more on this Wednesday.