Great swell for Sunday and Monday

Craig Brokensha picture
Craig Brokensha (Craig)

Victoria Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Friday 28th July)

Best Days: Surf Coast Sunday, Monday, Tuesday morning

Recap

Good waves across both coasts yesterday morning with dropping surf from Wednesday, hanging in at 2-3ft across the Surf Coast early and 3-4ft on the Mornington Peninsula.

The afternoon became smaller and tricky east of Melbourne with blustery offshore winds.

Today a new W/SW swell was on the build with clean 2ft waves across the Surf Coast reefs but poor conditions everywhere else. We should see sets peak just over 2ft on the Surf Coast as winds hold from the W/NW.

This weekend and next week (Jul 29 – Aug 4)

Today's W/SW swell was generated by a weak mid-latitude front pushing in from the Bight and through Bass Strait this morning.

With the front weakening into this afternoon we'll see the swell starting to ease later today, fading overnight and further from 1-1.5ft max on the Surf Coast tomorrow morning and 2-3ft on the Mornington Peninsula.

Conditions will be OK early with a fresh and gusty N/NE'ly favouring the Mornington Peninsula before the swell drops out.

We then look towards the W/SW swell event Sunday. Satellite observations overnight have picked up an incredible fetch of storm-force W'ly winds aimed in our western swell window, at the centre of a vigorous mid-latitude low sitting off the WA coast.

This will generate an initial pulse of long-period W/SW groundswell for Sunday morning, but a continued fetch of severe-gale to storm-force W/NW winds through today, followed by weakening severe-gale W/SW winds pushing east tomorrow should generate a secondary larger W/SW groundswell for the late afternoon.

Sunday morning's pulse should provide 4ft waves on the Surf Coast across exposed breaks and 6-8ft waves on the Mornington Peninsula. The late afternoon pulse should see sets reaching 5-6ft across magnets on the Surf Coast and 8ft+ to the east as fresh NW tending W/NW winds create great waves on the protected reefs.

Monday morning should still reveal plenty of size with easing sets in the 4-6ft range across the Surf Coast and 8ft sets on the Mornington Peninsula. A funky and weak trough is due to move through, and the models are a little divergent on an onshore change, but we'll see morning W/NW winds, favouring the Surf Coast, likely lighter onshore into the afternoon and possibly even variable.

With the weak nature of the trough we're likely to see morning W/NW winds again Tuesday as the W/SW swell continues to ease.

From Wednesday we'll enter a period of funky winds and weather as a surface trough deepens into a low off the southern NSW coast.

This will direct E'ly winds across our coasts along with some inconsistent small to moderate sized W/SW groundswell energy.

These swells will be generated in our far swell window and not offer too much size. More on this Monday, have a great weekend!

Comments

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 8:56am

The expected new long period swell seems to be a little late, but whoa! How's this J-curve from the last hour or two at Cape Sorell. Should translate to a rapid increase through the afternoon.

Vic Local's picture
Vic Local's picture
Vic Local Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 2:43pm

Seriously Ben. Why are you getting excited about this? Lets calmly and rationally look at the local conditions down here.
Morning: 1ft with howling offshore. Conclusion. Swell hasn't arrived.
Lunchtime: 1-2 ft and still howling offshore. Swell still hasn't arrived. I wonder if the fact that this is an acute westerly swell has anything to do with the lack of wave action? Plus the big high tide is not helping at all.
2.30pm 2 with the very occasional 3 footer with packed carparks, packed line ups and super inconsistent sets. You were calling 5-6ft.
Vic Local has tried hard over years to stop these ridiculous over-predictions. I've told you the exact conditions you do it in. Have you learnt nothing?

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 2:52pm

Yeah, the swell is certainly under expectations at the moment.

I didn't write the forecast notes (and haven't been watching the Southern Ocean charts over the last week or so) so I'll need Craig to provide a little more info when he is back in the office tomorrow - but I can't comment on the specifics otherwise.

But.. there'd be a lot more weight in your argument if you provided it in advance. It's easy to sit back now and say "I always knew it'd be like this" - but it has ten times more credibility if you put your neck on the chopping block before the actual day. Keeping in mind that there's still three hours of sunlight yet, and a late increase can't be ruled out either. 

For what its worth, Craig has had a bloody good run this year - I don't think he's missed any major event in quite a while. As such, I haven't seen your forecast commentary for quite a few months either.

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 2:57pm

Oh, and why am I getting excited? With Cape Sorell J-curving to Hsig of 6m (including six hours of 5.5m or higher), and Hmax of over 10m, with peak swell periods of 18 seconds and - most important of all - Tx of 11 seconds - this event is in the upper 10% of large swells in this region.

The reason Tx is so important is that it's a measure of the average of all swell periods, and with 20-30kts onshore winds in the region, a high windswell contamination would ordinarily reduce this to 7-8 seconds. So the fact that it punched up to 11 seconds means that it's a very strong, long period swell event. 

Whether the specifics are aligned for great waves in Torquay is another factor. But, buoy data gets me excited, and this kind of buoy data is right up there.

goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 3:12pm

8ft sets on the open beaches now

Vic Local's picture
Vic Local's picture
Vic Local Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 3:20pm

Hey Goofyfoot, those would be the beaches that face SW and not SE right? And Ben, I wouldn't go praising Craig too much. We had a ripping swell last week that flew under the Swellnet radar. It was only of those glorious days with few people in the water and it was super consistent.

goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 3:21pm

That's correct Vic Local

goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 3:34pm

Nice observation

Vic Local's picture
Vic Local's picture
Vic Local Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 3:55pm

Just got back from a surf check at Winki. 65 in the water. Another dozen suiting up. The Melbourne punters have seen the forecast and have come down in droves expecting pumping surf. With a 200km round trip, they are going surfing no matter what. It would be worth a surf with maybe 20 in the water but not 40, and certainly not 70.
Silly crowds like today's can best be summed up by the term, "the swellnet effect".

udo's picture
udo's picture
udo Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 4:18pm

Whats the wave size now ?

Vic Local's picture
Vic Local's picture
Vic Local Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 4:52pm

Cleaning my gutters. Can't face 70 flappers in the line up so may as well get some brownie points up with the Mrs.

lostdoggy's picture
lostdoggy's picture
lostdoggy Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 4:59pm

It's Winki on a Sunday. I'd lay more blame on all the new Geelong and Torquay estates than hordes from Melb. Sunday crowds have nothing to do with 'Swellnet effect'.
It is when a swell is forecast midweek and suddenly everyone has the day off and the swell is inconsistent that is frustrating.

Vic Local's picture
Vic Local's picture
Vic Local Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 5:18pm

Point taken re population explosion down here. The casualisation of the workforce increases crowds during the week, but good luck trying to change those two trends. The two crowd increasing factors I can't handle is the constant overcalling of swells by online forecasters who don't even live in the area, and punters getting on their phones to tell their mates how good the surf is. "Yeah Bells is pumping, come out mate" or worse "there's a great bank at ..."
And while I'm having a good rant, if it's crowded and inconsistent don't farken paddle out and make things worse. If there's 40 guys in the water and sets every 20 minutes with 3 waves each, you've got fuck all chance of getting a wave, especially since every single person in the lineup has been waiting longer than you. You're just another speed hump in the lineup.
And to the young bloke with blond dreadlocks, well done the other week for taking a bomb on the head while Vic Local was heading towards boobs. Well played young man. Well played.

velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 12:42pm

+1 for casualisation of workforce.
Carpark was overflowing this Monday AM and it did raise a comment or two. Imagine what it will be like in an actual recession, with those 'Surfing for Malcolm' or 'Surfing for Bill'...

goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 6:17pm

That was me

Victoriasurfing1's picture
Victoriasurfing1's picture
Victoriasurfing1 Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 6:24pm

hahahahaha vic local are you taking the piss, stop winging. What do you expect on a sunday at one of the most well known waves in Victoria, stop kidding yourself. Maybe just don't surf there on the weekends and go surf at one of the great waves nearby, pretty simple instead of coming on here and being a dickhead

maddogmorley's picture
maddogmorley's picture
maddogmorley Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 6:29pm

Where is the 'like' button? :)

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 6:40pm

How big did it get on the Surf Coast this afternoon? Doesn't look like it got anywhere near 6ft.

But possibly 5ft across the reefs. Without any first-hand reports (as yet), the evidence I have is from the Torquay surfcam - see below.

No-one was sitting out the back so the biggest waves were going unridden, but using the images we have here of a few surfers on the inside section (one of 'em is a clubbie on his knees) - doesn't look very far off 3ft here. See the first three images.

So, as the sets on the outside reef are bigger, this means they're probably around the 4ft mark (see last two images). I've used this camera as a size reference for many years and it looks around 4ft to me - though would have been a lot better if someone was up and riding (the high tide wasn't helping things). 

And as a general rule, Bells and Winki are usually a foot (if not two) feet bigger than Torquay, which means we should have been seeing some sets closer to 5ft around this time.

It's only a rough estimation at this point, and certainly on the lower side of forecast expectations - though goofyfoot's comments above shows that the East Coast came in line with the outlook.





Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 9:39pm

Jeez, bloody west swells. I was worried I had under forecast the size looking at the ASCAT satellite observations, but with the front pushing east and with Cape Sorell hitting 6-10m, even if W/SW, for the Surf Coast to remain small..

Any reports of late today size?

carpetman's picture
carpetman's picture
carpetman Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 10:09pm

Size argument is subjective... but I couldn't call those screen shots anything close to 4ft.

You guys are typically spot on but lately I'd agree with VL. Some overcalling in forecasts, but also in the sc reports. A number of days where I've watch for an hour, seen, maybe, 3x1wave sets at two foot, on the reefs. Report says 2ft surf. Check the mp report and they're saying 2ft also. Doesn't add up. Maybe inconsistency isn't being identified enough in your written forecasts? And although inconsistent is often used in the reports, if there's only 3 2ft waves over the entire day I don't think you can call the surf two foot.
You guys do a great job, not having a dog, just trying to be constructive.

thermalben's picture
thermalben's picture
thermalben Sunday, 30 Jul 2017 at 10:19pm

Appreciate the constructive criticism. Surf report size will always be at the mercy of individual subjectivity, it'd be nice to have a a technical instrument in the way air temps do by use of a thermometer, but it ain't possible in the surf department unfortunately.

Fourth image looks around four foot to me.. but as I mentioned, it would have been a lot easier if someone paddled out there for the sets.

We'll probably see some images tomorrow from the late session at Bells. Will have a scout around in the AM.

greyhound's picture
greyhound's picture
greyhound Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 11:17am

I saw it as folllows.
1/2 feet around 8 am, 3/4 by lunch, surfed till 4 pm with the odd 5 footer thrown in. Surfed on my own for 1.5 hours of the 5 in the water. Max of 10 people. . All within eyesight of bells/ winki.
Swell arrived a half a day late and was somewhat swallowed by the evening high tide.

goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot's picture
goofyfoot Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 11:22am

5 hr session? Shit yes that's a top effort.
What type of wetsuit do you have?

greyhound's picture
greyhound's picture
greyhound Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 12:56pm

Ripcurl ebomb. 5/4. Got it OS. I find it odd that you can't get the full range of thicknesses in the birthplace of ripcurl.

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 11:35am

Thanks for that, the best swell was only due mid-late afternoon in any case and I didn't factor the high tide swallowing most of it. The morning pulse was the one that came in way under, bit bummed as the satellite pass for this swell was great.

velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno Monday, 31 Jul 2017 at 12:51pm

Checked in town on dusk Sunday and saw no more than 3ft, so that would make mostly 4 on the main reefs.

This morning was lovely surface conditions, inconsistent, 3ft-ish on one of the lesser reefs.

Edit: cold early confirmed when radio called 10am temp as still 9 degrees! BOM at Geelong racecourse had an 8.8 at 9:30am - so that part of the daily report was spot on.