South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 17th February)

Best Days: Most days will have great waves but Thurs/Fri and maybe even Sat (mainly in the south) will probaly become wind affected from the NE so aim for an early paddle. Back to S/SE breezes from Sunday, favouring the SE Qld outer points though with smaller swells. Potentilaly a large, long period E'ly swell from Tuesday onwards with great surf beyond this, as far as my eyes can see.

Recap: Impossible to complain over the last two days. The expected renewal of E’ly swell came in bang on size expectations - generally 3-5ft across most coasts; a little lully but very well defined, and producing some incredible footage from the usual suspects. The only feature of major interest from a hindcasting perspective was that the swell kicked in early/mid morning on Tuesday, rather than in the afternoon as I had suggested in these notes. But I was never very confident with the timing on this particular pulse anyway, for a bunch of reasons that I’ve gone into detail about before (so I won’t bore you with the specifics a second time 'round). Tuesday’s winds were light offshore in most areas early, and fresh NE sea breezes created problems into the afternoon. Today’s southerly change was weaker than expected, which had two flow on effects - (1) the morning offshore persisted for a little longer, and (2) due to the weaker gradient flow, we’ve seen winds swing more to the SE, even E’ly in some regions. 

This week (Feb 18th - 19th)

In short, no major changes for the rest of the week, which contains an an interesting dual swell situation for Northern NSW.

Essentially, our current easterly swell will continue to do what it’s done for the last few days, though we’ll probably see the consistency start to drop, thanks to the swell source retreating eastward earlier in the week as TC Winston tracked towards Samoa. 

So, expect longer breaks between the bigger sets - across SE Qld, you’ll probably be doing most of your surfing in the sub-3ft range both Thursday and Friday, with fifteen minutes or more between bigger sets that'll be somewhere near 4ft+ (with smaller surf as you work your way down the points). These bigger sets may also have a smaller wave count than what we’ve been seeing over the last few days - again, attributable to the long travel distance. For crowd control reasons, this combo will favour the beachies over the points.

Aim for a morning surf with early light variable winds, as NE sea breezes will freshen from mid-late morning onwards. Similarly inconsistent swells will persist on Friday, and the nor’easter will become a little fresher, a little earlier - so you will have to aim for a morning paddle once again.

Thursday's size range will also hold steady from the east across Northern NSW, but we have a strong secondary southerly swell pushing up the coast that will provide solid waves to south swell magnets south of Byron. This swell was generated by a deep Southern Ocean low that stalled in our swell window yesterday (near Tasmania) and has today pushed up into the southern Tasman Sea. 

Model guidance has every so slightly pulled back the strength of this low, so I have correspondingly wound back the size projections a smidge. We should see a peak through late Thursday afternoon (Mid North Coast) with Friday morning seeing the peak across the Far North Coast. South facing beaches should see solid 4-5ft sets from this source, though the swell direction will create much smaller waves at beaches not directly open to the south (though, this won’t be a problem as much as it usually is, because of the solid pre-existing E’ly swell).

Some south swell magnets north of the border may pick up occasional 3ft sets from the south on Friday but the easterly swell will probably remain dominant.

It’s also certainly not out of the question to expect occasional bigger rogue waves from time to time at exposed beaches in Northern NSW, if we see the easterly and southerly swell trains combining in the surf zone. But this will be the exception rather than the rule at most locations. Expect the southerly swell to ease slowly through Friday, more quickly in the south than in the north.

Light winds and NE sea breeze are expected on Thursday, whilst freshening NE winds will likely create problems through Friday at most locations so you will have to aim for an early surf will conditions are calm and/or variable.  

This weekend (Feb 20th - 21st)

We’ve got a great weekend of waves ahead.

A weak trough near New Caledonia on Friday is expected to move slowly westward, and a narrow high pressure system in the central/northern Tasman Sea is expected to drive a ridge across the Queensland coast - but probably not until Saturday afternoon (and more so into Sunday).

So, Saturday is at risk of fresh NE sea breezes developing - mainly in Northern NSW, especially south of about Byron Bay. Elsewhere we may see more of an early light variable wind tend E/SE throughout the afternoon, ahead of freshening S/SE thru’ SE winds on Sunday (following a brief window of early SW winds). I’ll update the wind particulars in more detail on Friday. 

As for surf, both of Friday’s sources - (south and east) will slowly ease. A minor intensification of the Tasman Low near New Zealand’ South Island tomorrow now looks like it won’t be quite enough to generate any meaningful increase, so expect easing size from Saturday morning (early 3ft sets at south facing beaches) down to 1-2ft by Sunday. 

The E’ly swell should still manage peaky 3ft+ surf across SE Qld and Northern NSW beaches on Saturday, but it’ll ease slowly throughout the day and into Sunday, where we're looking at very inconsistent 2-3ft surf at exposed beaches.

However, the building ridge across the Qld coast will extend quite a broad distance into the Coral Sea and this should rebuild short range SE swell across SE Qld and Far Northern NSW into Sunday. Surf size will be biggest at open beaches on the Sunshine Coast (3ft+ by the afternoon, smaller earlier), but these spots will be wind affected. Surf size will become smaller with increasing southerly latitude - we’re probably looking at 2-3ft+ across the Gold Coast, with smaller surf at the outer points, and then smaller waves as you travel south of the border. 

Next week (Feb 22nd onwards)

The latest model runs are holding true for TC Winston with a possible sharp southerly then westerly recurve later this week, aimed back into our region - and at Cat 4 strength, plus the added bonus of a strong supporting ridge to the south-east. The synoptics look insane.

Whilst this system is still a considerable distance from the mainland, its impressive longevity and desirable forward track through our swell window (notwithstanding the potential interference by some South Pacific islands, depending on the precise location of the core fetch) augers well for an increase in strong, long period E’ly groundswell early Tuesday, persisting through Wednesday and then easing slowly from Thursday. 

At this stage it’s completely reasonable to expect solid surf reaching 5-6ft+ across exposed coasts, though this size range will require a few things to come together - if the models change then we could see a downgrade. But confidence is certainly increasing on this prospects of this happening.

Otherwise, the Coral Sea ridge will maintain small but useful trade swell for SE Qld and Far Northern NSW on Monday and Tuesday. 

TC Winston is currently expected to main strength in the South Pacific until the end of the model run, so in reality we could be looking at some kind of easterly swell persisting through until the end of next weekend. If that eventuates, then TC Winston could be the first weather system in a very long time to supply almost two weeks of continual swell. I’ll have to check on the specifics but could this be a record swell duration for a Tropical Cyclone? I’m not sure, but either way it’ll be worth celebrating.