Large swell, best Wednesday good Thursday and Friday

Craig Brokensha picture
Craig Brokensha (Craig)

Victoria Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday 27th October)

Best Days: Tuesday morning protected spots on the Surf Coast, Wednesday Surf Coast, Thursday Surf Coast, Friday both coasts, Saturday morning Surf Coast

Recap

Lingering onshores from Friday afternoon's weak change created average conditions across the state on Saturday with small amounts of swell, while a long-range increase in small SW groundswell Sunday offered slightly better 3-4ft sets.

More variable breezes created workable conditions most of the day before a mid-late afternoon E'ly kicked in.

Today is poor with onshore winds and a tiny swell. The change that pushed through early this morning should bring with it an increase in short-range W'ly swell, but we've got much more interesting developments on the cards for tomorrow and Wednesday.

This week (Oct 28 - 31)

Tomorrow afternoon's and Wednesday's swell has been upgraded significantly, with a secondary frontal system that was expected to move in, in the wake of today's being upgraded in strength and intensity.

We're now looking at a fetch of severe-gale to storm-force W/SW winds being projected up and into us today and tomorrow, producing a large and powerful long-period SW groundswell.

This swell should kick solidly tomorrow from midday onwards, reaching 6ft+ across exposed breaks on the Surf Coast later in the day, with 8ft sets likely at Bells and Winki, while the Mornington Peninsula should pulse to 8-10ft near dark.

A peak in size is expected overnight ahead of a rapid drop through Wednesday from the 5-6ft+ and 8ft range respectively on the Surf Coast and Mornington Peninsula.

Winds tomorrow before the swell really kicks will be OK for protected spots on the Surf Coast but strong from the W/NW ahead of a shift to the W/SW through the day.

Wednesday will be the day to surf through as winds swing back to a moderate to fresh W/NW'ly (even NW at times) ahead of a weaker W/SW'ly through the mid-afternoon.

The easing trend will steady into Thursday as moderate amounts of reinforcing W/SW swell fill in, ahead of one final pulse of better SW groundswell Friday morning.

This should be produced by a polar front deepening into a polar low to our south-west tomorrow evening, producing a small fetch of severe-gale to storm-force W/SW winds through our window.

The size of this swell will be limited due to the low forming later in our swell window, being further away and the fetch being much smaller, but the Surf Coast should pulse back to 3-4ft+ Friday morning with 6ft to possibly 8ft sets on the Mornington Peninsula ahead of an easing trend during the day.

Winds look great with Thursday seeing N/NW tending SW winds, favouring the Surf Coast, while Friday will be good at more exposed breaks (although large in size) with a N/NE tending N'ly breeze (N'ly tending N/NW at times on the Surf Coast).

This weekend onwards (Nov 1 onwards)

We've got a couple of more healthy SW groundswell pulses on the cards from continued polar frontal activity being steered up towards us through the weekend. Winds for these pulses don't look as favourable as this week, but we'll review this again Wednesday.

Comments

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Tuesday, 28 Oct 2014 at 12:06pm

Cape Sorell has kicked in a big way.. www.bom.gov.au/products/IDT65014.shtml

Be very solid this afternoon in Victoria but winds will spoil the party.

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Tuesday, 28 Oct 2014 at 2:23pm

Wowz 8m @ 14 now

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Tuesday, 28 Oct 2014 at 11:51pm

Wowz 9m @ 17 sec at cape sorrel . Sheepdog have u been surfin today ?

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 4:26am

Will this swell make it all the way to fiji & isei at cloudbreaks

mitchvg's picture
mitchvg's picture
mitchvg Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:00am

Haha camel is this your version of staying up to watch the ashes? Frothing!

Sheepdog's picture
Sheepdog's picture
Sheepdog Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:30am

Banks are fucked atm down my way caml...... My setup is similar to Clifton, but more open to se swell, a little less open to sw swell, and west or wsw aren't the best.... Was about 2 to 3 foot, but just shorebangers..... A boogyboarder would've had fun.... But a waste of time for an old codger.....

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:58am

Camel, not the same swell, but same storm system.

So this large swell for Vicco and Tas was generated by this low here..

But you can see most of the fetch and swell is going to be blocked by Tas.

Cloudbreak will get the swell from the low as it pushed east of Tasmania and into the Tasman Sea last night..

The swell from the low as it pushed into the Tasman Sea will build strongly this afternoon in Sydney and peak in Fiji on Saturday.

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 10:56am

Even longer period stuff arriving at CB on Monday. Not bad for November!!!!

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:02am

Yeah Don, that's from a polar low that's firing up further south in latitude than the last system, during today..

Someone who visits this site regularly will be there..

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:09am

My mate is flying in on Sat for a week.

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:29am

Nice, gonna score some real nice waves!!

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:30am

He wasn't wanting 'real nice' waves. He assumed November would be more playful waves!!!!

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:35am

Haha, he's gonna be shitting himself when the bombs come through!

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:39am

I think he's got restaurants in mind.

mick-free's picture
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mick-free Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:49am

Surfline has given the first one 'purple blob of the week award'

http://instagram.com/p/utdqSTKZ82/?modal=true

Think Monday better longer period on active sea state.

Any reports from Vicco only got Sean Doherty dry docked on the button

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:52am

Yeah, pumping 6ft+ Surf Coast.

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 1:53pm

Yeah mitch as a dedicated storm chaser i was on watch most of the night checking on the swells progress . Was most interested by tassies size then K.I. Size and esp lack of size . So checking cloudbreak forecast was just out of fantasy interest . A mate has been praying somthing comes his way in sydney so we've been talking about it together also .

mitchvg's picture
mitchvg's picture
mitchvg Friday, 31 Oct 2014 at 2:07pm

Haha, well you can stream the 2nd test here http://live.extracover.pw/ while you wait the 26.6min in between buoy updates!

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 1:56pm

Yeah Cape du Couedic didn't show anywhere near as much size as the low formed later in its swell window and was more aimed into the Tassie West Coast. Still it got to 5-9m @ 15s overnight.

Also there would of been a lot of windswell contamination at Sorell with gusts of 58kts measured at 9:45am yesterday morning.

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 1:58pm

The surfline instagram re kevin has said what i was going to say about the storm / swell . Moving on from tas to fiji .

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 2:03pm

"Tasmania will get blasted by swell and gale force west wind on Wednesday, while breaks in southeast Australia will see a smaller, but still good size, portion of the swell on Wednesday with much lighter west wind."

Surf Coast was 6ft+ this morning and the best it's been in months. Bit better than a good size portion of the swell.

Anyways, yeah same storm but kinda two different swell events that would be hard to decipher just looking at the purple blob swell height charts.

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 3:52pm

Roga dat craig but not hard for me to decipher , I can see it ,and besides im good friends with huey we hang out and talk lots

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 3:55pm

Haha, you and me both. Sometimes he doesn't wan't to listen though and goes his own seperate way!

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 5:46pm

Yeah your middle name is huey craig . So how big will sat morn be at CB ? Compared with the recent big swell there ?

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 5:59pm

I'd say 8-10ft Camel, real nice!

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:30pm

Wow that's way above what your model is forecasting?

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:32pm

Yeah, it doesn't forecast these long-range swells very well. Size is always bigger than forecast. Gets the real big swells nicely, but the small-moderate pulses need to be boosted.

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:33pm

I'd be thinking 6-8ft with 10ft bombs.

donweather's picture
donweather's picture
donweather Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:58pm

Hmmm that's odd cause your model outputs nailed it for where I was in Indo and it doesn't get much more long range than that and they weren't big swells either.

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 6:47am

This is only for Cloudbreak I should say.

Great for other locations around the world, but Cloudbreak seems to be some crazy swell magnet!

Also, that's great to hear!

mick-free's picture
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mick-free Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:17pm

Craig Huey Brokensha haha love it.

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 9:21pm

Haha, well seeing as I don't have a middle name...

wellymon's picture
wellymon's picture
wellymon Wednesday, 29 Oct 2014 at 11:42pm

What..! No middle name..?
Not Grandads.
Not your Dads..?

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 10:11am

Nup, but my younger brothers both got them, weird ay!

southey's picture
southey's picture
southey Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 1:44am

All this time I thought your middle name was ' bro ' ...
And that you'd just rolled it into one !
Craig Bro Kensha.w
Hiding your real identity -: Ken Bradshaw ..... ;-))

shaun's picture
shaun's picture
shaun Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 6:30am

Surfin the net a 2 in the morning southey. a life sadder than mine.

Get a surf? Went up to the circus coast masulf , very wonkey in the morning, sea-breeze came in mid morning, had a better surf at Rincon at high tide before the wind blew it right out, swell straightened up with bombs every 20 minutes, not bad 10 out , 3 surfing, no doubt wotd will make it look close to perfect, very rarely is. Looking forward to a summer of secret spots and magic moments after a very bad winter.

southey's picture
southey's picture
southey Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 9:10am

nah shaun ,
had just finished working and didn't realise the time ...
besides i can post then without fear of response !....?
Friday not looking as good now , i reckon i might be wandering down your way next week .

shaun's picture
shaun's picture
shaun Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 9:59am

Yeah, well fuck off, no waves in gippsland.

caml's picture
caml's picture
caml Thursday, 30 Oct 2014 at 12:18pm

You can feel more important posting in the middle of night

velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno's picture
velocityjohnno Friday, 31 Oct 2014 at 2:17pm

What a Rather Epic Week. Just woke up and surfed it rather than check this very valuable post, cheers in absentium Craig! More size (and wind) on the way...
Hey Sheepdog, from where I think you are, would a certain point named in favour of a dirty black substance, far away over an inland sea from you - had any goods when the big ones rolled through? Seen it a few times beginning to break and thought it might be a great setup on the day.