Victorian Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Friday May 9th)

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Fun waves all weekend with light winds and a strong reinforcing swell Sat, easing Sun (outside chance for an embedded pulse Sun too)
• Small leftovers Mon/Tues
• Potentially strong new swell combo for Wed PM, though winds unsure
• Another strong swell event Fri/Sat/Sun

Recap

What a great week of waves it’s been. Thursday continued the late peak in groundswell from Wednesday, offering early 6ft+ sets west of Melbourne and 8ft+ east of Melbourne, with quality options along the Surf Coast reefs and also inside Western Port. Conditions were clean at these locations with winds veering back offshore though early Thursday did see some leftover wobble at exposed spots along all coasts. Size has eased back overnight to 4ft west of Melbourne and 5-6ft to the east, with winds out of the NW favouring the Surf Coast once again. Western Port still has small waves though it’s well past the peak and continuing to ease in size. 

Thursday delivered the goods

So did Friday!

This weekend (May 10 - 11)

No major changes to the weekend forecast, with a reinforcing W/SW swell expected to push through overnight, arresting today’s easing trend and maintaining 3-4ft sets west of Melbourne on Saturday. East of Melbourne will be much bigger, still 4-6ft across open beaches but it’ll be a touch too small for Western Port.

Light variable winds are expected under a weak high pressure system so conditions should be good for most of the day. There’s a possibility for a weak easterly breeze in the afternoon but I don’t think it’ll spoil conditions if it does crop up.

Sunday will generally see an easing trend with the Surf Coast holding early 2-3ft sets (4ft east of Melbourne, becoming smaller during the day) though we may see a fleeting pulse of S/SW swell from a polar low attached to the backside of the front responsible for Saturday’s reinforcing swell. 

This fetch had been mentioned in my Tasmanian notes all week but I omitted it from my Victorian notes, as model guidance earlier in the week had the low a little further to the east (and thus inside the Tasmanian swell shadow). 

The low has since been moved a little further to the west - right on the periphery of Victoria’s swell window - so we may receive a glancing blow of energy on Sunday, but it’s a low confidence event. I’ll update in the comments if anything of interest appears at the regional buoys suggesting an associated upgrade in size. 

Next week (May 12 onwards)

Smaller leftover surf is expected on Monday with a weak trough expected to cross the coast late in the day. This will gradually freshen NW winds ahead of a late SW change though wind strengths won’t amount to much so conditions should be relatively unaffected. Surf size will be small west of Melbourne though (unless Sunday's aformentioned S/SW pulse appears and overperforms), so it’s probably not worth getting too excited about.

I’m still expecting a small long period swell to arrive later Monday and Tuesday, generated by a small but tight low passing near Heard Island yesterday, but without much surf size at the coast due to the large travel distance and short fetch length. So, ignore the Cape Sorell buoy when peak periods spike up to 18+ seconds. 

The latter stages of this low will track below the continent on Sunday and Monday, generating a better SW swell for Wednesday (probably the afternoon) that should boost the Surf Coast back up into the 2-3ft range, though sets will be slow going. 

Another short wave trough trailing behind has been amplified in the latest model runs and is now expected to display a thin fetch of 40-50kt winds within our near swell window overnight Monday into Tuesday. This should generate a secondary swell for Wednesday afternoon that could push as high as 3-5ft in Torquay, albeit for a brief period.

Model guidance has the front associated with this low (only modest in strength, locally) crossing the coast sometime around that period - though the timing is not clear, either late Tuesday or early Wednesday - so it’s not clear how favourable conditions will be for Wednesday’s new swell combo. Ideally we’ll see the former, which will allow for an easing of winds on Wednesday just prior to the new swell arriving.

The rest of the outlook period looks very good, despite a downgrade in the synoptics since Wednesday’s forecast was issued.

A strong series of fronts currently developing below Africa will migrate throughout our swell window all week, generating an impressive fetch that will develop a lengthy swell event for the Victorian coast, arriving overnight Thursday and then pulsing at strength through Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

This is expected to provide two or three three days of waves in the 4-6ft range west of Melbourne, with the peak of the swell - currently pegged for Saturday - possibly pushing a foot or two higher for a brief period.

Again, it’s still early days but it’s a very promising swell pattern ahead as we move through the last few weeks of autumn.