Poor winds and junky swells for the outlook
Victorian Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday 20th December)
Best Days: Tuesday morning
Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)
- Building SE windswell tomorrow PM, holding Fri, easing Sat
- Strong E/SE tending SE winds tomorrow, similar Fri
- Small-mod sized mid-period SW swell for Sat, easing Sun
- Mod-fresh E/SE-SE tending SE winds Sat/Sun
- Moderate sized SW groundswell for later Mon, easing Tue
- Moderate sized SE windswell for Mon PM, easing Tue
- Strong E/SE winds Mon, NE tending S/SW on Tue
- Easing surf Wed with strong SW winds
Recap
Strong onshore winds developed through yesterday along with the arrival of a good SW groundswell which peaked later in the day and is now easing though today. Conditions are still a mess and there's nowhere to escape this wind as the swell eases.
This week and next (Dec 21 - 29)
The forecast for the end of the week and weekend remains poor, so does early next week across the state.
This will be thanks to persistent poor winds from the south-eastern quadrant owing to persistent high pressure setting up camp west of us, squeezed by a stationary inland trough. All linked to a + Southern Annular Mode event.
Into tomorrow we're due to see winds shift E/SE-SE and remain strong with some localised, building SE windswell (3ft+ Surf Coast), similar Friday with no real window of lighter east winds to the east.
Wind strengths are due to ease a little on Saturday but remain out of the E/SE-SE, spoiling some small-moderate sized mid-period SW swell.
The localised windswell will be more dominant in any case with no real options for a quality surf.
Moderate to fresh E/SE-SE winds will continue on Sunday, strengthening into the afternoon and evening as a trough slides through, reinforced by a new ridge of high pressure next week.
This secondary high looks more mobile, though strong afternoon and evening E/SE winds into Monday will kick up another solid SE windswell event to 4ft+ or so on the Surf Coast, mixed in with some inconsistent but good SW groundswell through the afternoon.
The source of the groundswell will be an intensification in the stream of frontal activity moving under the country, with a low due to generate a fetch of W/SW gales over the coming days (above left).
Both the SW groundswell and SE windswell will ease into Tuesday as winds finally improve, swinging NE in the morning as the inland trough forms a broad low. The low will move slowly east on Wednesday, bringing a shallow SW change Tuesday and then strong SW winds Wednesday.
Coming back to the expected size Tuesday morning, the Surf Coast should ease back from a peaky 3-4ft with 5-6ft sets to the east, a little too big for the beaches which is unfortunate.
Longer term more poor winds are due into the New Year, but we'll review this on Friday.
Comments
Grim.
Yeah, not great at all eh.
Craig, is that "small-moderate sized mid-period SW swell." still forecast to be 4'+ to the east?
Yep.
Thanks Craig
wonder how the tulla tub's been doing with this rubbish run everywhere else? I was surprised to see that the amount of sessions running seems to be less when i checked a few weeks back...
never surfed the tub byt some crew have said that it still needs a N/NE to work best. maybe this explains why there are less sessions?
Wind doesn't really impact wave quality at the tub that much. The barrels are probably the most impacted by wind, but still lots of fun when it's howling onshore.
In saying that, ocean is always best, provided we get a good forecast - Come on Huey, send us some waves.
C'mon Huey/Santa.
I've been a good boy. I really have.
But now you dish up this for Christmas.
Better be a tub voucher under the tree or i'm completely stuffed.
Christmas turkey stuffed?
Positive SAM and weakening IOD combining to produce strong and persistent cold southerlies and more frequent rain?
Relentless southerlies lasting for weeks at a time, still needing a jumper most days, endless grey sky’s and wet weather and now a big rain event that might ruin the xmas break. Worst. El Niño. Ever
Not like last year’s epic Boxing Day conditions
Yeah, that bombing low generated a crazy swell eh!
Looking at forecast for the next week, be interesting where this December lands in terms of coldest December for Victoria. Certainly feels the shittest that I can recall when you add in the relentless SE's. Last year it was split in two halves. Cold and shit for the first half then it came good before Xmas and we got the beautiful swell to add a cherry on top.
They've generally been cold for many years now - nothing like the 43 days we'd record with the hot northerlies I remember sweltering in our house from 2009-13 or so. It has been as if climate change's increasing temperatures have bypassed this area. The last 3 I remember lots of SE in La Nina and dog beach walks. This one isn't too different - but there are the odd NE days and we've just had a small run where winds went westerly. The big change this year is the collapse of Antarctic sea ice levels.
One event I remember was after that stratospheric wave off the Andes, where we went cold in November/Dec and this time turned into something like May with cold winds and 3-5ft offshore swell for days. What year was that? 2017? 2018?
As below, the garden has been mental this year, so much yield. Grass is green still, nothing like I was expecting in El Nino. Which Craig did a great article for.
That was 2019 VJ. Brought up the storm track and strong NW winds into late spring in summer. With record low soil moisture thanks to the record + IOD it all went up.
Current events are linked to a strong + SAM, similar to what we see with La Niña's. And all that warm water which is pretty nuts country wide.
Thanks Craig, is a +SAM generally bad for the SC? I remember also driving up to the MNC in the lead up to the 2019 fires and taking the inland route... every single paddock was dry, literally dry as dirt with nothing growing on it in some areas. No wonder it all went up. One thing I've noticed about south western Vic is even in events like the Millennium drought the 70kms closest to the coast (say, from Grampians south) tend to keep a bit of green about them. It's got what cows crave.
Yeah, sub-tropical high slides further south bringing those southerly and south-easterly winds. The westerly storm track also retreats but strengthens. So swell but with average winds.
As someone who has managed parks and gardens for 40 years plus, plant growth is phenomenal with all this humidity and frequent rains and warm soil temps.
Was thinking a few months ago by now with an El Nino I would be irrigating and trying to keep plants alive.....exact opposite weeds and grass gone nuts.
My novelty SE wind swell break has almost become my go to.
Getting over 1kg of cherries per limb!