Happy New Year!!!

[Donweather]

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[miiichael]

The Wait Begins!

[puurri]

most years NYD turns on a decent wave in Sinny.

[miiichael]

hopefully it keep's up this tradition!

[wanto]

fizzzz. ..... pop.

[mustkillmulloway]

ahhhh...honestly, why do u even bother

another hoax swell and another fail prediction

[Revolution]

none and 42

[FishStick]

The wave heights in the forecasts are bloody confusing. It's been called 2 foot for the past few days here in Sydney but to me it looks like the real 2 feet as in 60 cm.
I'd call it 1/2 foot

[steve shearer]

Next one will do the biz.

[Donweather]

Yes things are certainly looking up on the swell front, but she looks to be a rather wild, wet and woolly affair, particularly if GFS comes to fruition.

I'm wishing more so for EC, which has the low pressure system some distance off the coast, hence whilst swell heights would be smaller than the GFS forecast, she'd (EC) certainly have better wave quality.

I find these low pressure systems just off the coast a wee bit of a hoax. If you're north of the axis of the low, you get some very good offshore conditions (assuming she's a closed low) but you get very little in the way of swell, apart from the quick window just as the low slides south.

If you're south of the axis of the low, you get some sizey swell, but strong to gale force winds too boot, leaving very few limited surfing options to all but the super protected points, where every man and his dog is fighting the hideous sweeps.

So I'm praying for EC, which would open up far better options for surfing localities in my opinion.

[Nick Carroll]

what fantasy is this.

Just forget about it for the next month. Lame-arse longer range s groundswells for those exposed to such things. Otherwise saggy bottomed e chop. Any swell from e will be accompanied by filthy winds.

[steve shearer]

what fantasy is this.

.

Don't know what synoptic chart your looking at Nick but both GFS and EC are progging a fairly serious swell generating pattern for the lower Coral Sea.
In GFS case a repeat of the coast hugging hybrid low that produced 8-10 foot tow surf on the Goldy and devestating floods for the northern rivers region between chrissie and New years last year.
EC puts the low further out in the Coral Sea in an even better position for serious E swell generation.
To summarise what is happening RIGHT NOW : a serious NW monsoonal burst is drifting south down the QLD interior.....analysis of current radar images and weather obs put the leading edge of that tropical surge around Mackay.
A strong upper trough is also active in a line extending inland from the CQ coast.
When the strong SE winds from a ridging high reach that area of instability, the resulting convergence zone has a very good chance of spawning a hybrid low (hybrid because it forms along the trough line and is not a purely tropical feature).
At any rate if a low forms it looks likely to drift SE parallel to the coast in response to a mid-level NW/NNW steering flow.
Worst case scenario is for a sustained burst of SE windswell and head high waves on the points.
The big X in the equation is how fast the SE change moves up the coast, slower the better , according to the GFS scenario.
At time of writing (11.40am) change is just puffing up here at Lennox Head, not with any great vigour.
Don't be surprised if some radical weather develops quite quickly over the weekend.
But I'm with you Don, these storm swells from local lows are more a curse than a blessing. Still , after the flat spell we've had , I'd just be happy to see an overhead wave.
Steve

[Donweather]

If GFS comes to fruition however I reckon the Northern Rivers are gonna cop some serious wet weather, making the beaches a rather chocolate brown debri filled washing machine me thinks.

I'd be interested on your thoughts on the models though Steve. If all the signs are pointing towards a lovely little low pressure system off the coast, then why haven't the BOM issued any real warnings as yet?

In my experience I've found GFS to be reasonably reliable in the 0-3 day forecast time frame, so I'm tending to lean towards it's forecast at least for the weekend.

EC seems to be the only real outlier at the moment??

[Nick Carroll]

I'd be interested on your thoughts on the models though Steve. If all the signs are pointing towards a lovely little low pressure system off the coast, then why haven't the BOM issued any real warnings as yet?

Because the models are on the gear. I'm very keen to see the general pattern shift, would wallow in a bleed-off ENE groundswell from such a system, but the air moving up the NSW coast right now just doesn't have much zing and it probably won't put much pressure on the monsoon wave. Likely result: soft, soggy weather, relatively not a lot of wind etc.

Best we'll end up getting is bluebottles I reckon.

[steve shearer]

BOM have recently issued a strong wind warning for South Coastal waters due to a low forming off Gladstone.
They have it remaining weak though and drifting out into the CS.
Whichever way you slice it, there's surf on the horizon.
I'm thinking GFS might be overcooking things.....gee they're sticking to their guns though.
Don't want another repeat of last januarys floods here ead cows on the beach, massive fish kill in the Richmond, putrid brown water that took 2 months to clear up.
It wrote off the whole summer.
I'd prefer a semi-stationary area of low pressure near New Caledonia that successive high pressure systems can mate with.....the EC scenario, and a couple of weeks of E swell in the 3-6 foot range. That would go a long way to putting right what has been oh-so-wrong this past couple of months.
Steve

[Donweather]

but the air moving up the NSW coast right now just doesn't have much zing and it probably won't put much pressure on the monsoon wave.

Yeah true, but I note that the GFS forecast also doesn't really indicate a great deal of zing in the SE change.....not until that low moves out over water anyways!!

[Donweather]

I'm thinking GFS might be overcooking things.....gee they're sticking to their guns though.

Yeah that's what worries me. GFS have been sticking to their guns for the last 3-5 days with the formation and location of the low and one would have expected GFS and EC to meet somewhere in the middle as the forecasting time went on (ie with the low out into the Coral Sea further). But even with only 24 hours out to the possible deepending of this low off the SE Qld coast, GFS is still strongly running with the idea.

Only Huey knows the real answer I guess anyway. Don't envy you trying to pull a forecast together today for Sunday and Monday though Steve. It could be anywhere between 3-4ft and 6-8ft, depending on the scenario and surf locality.

[steve shearer]

Well GFS certainly phcuked up big time with that call but as it stands , it's a damm good thing.
A semi-stationary low pressure region drifting in the Coral Sea (the original Low progged by GFS , did move off the CQ coast , drifted NE and is weakening).
Looks like a nice sustained tradewind swell regime, with a better outlook as the low drifts southward and mates with the next high moving into the tasman Wed.
As far as "fantasy" goes, I've spent about 35 of my 40 years on this planet in QLD and Northern NSW.
The pulse of the summer monsoon waxes and wanes in every fukn cell of my body.
While some have been gallivanting on the NS, most have been doing hard time making sense of the scientific, sensory and emotional cues which signal the start of the monsoon.
The "triple whammy" of a strong IOD, negative PDO and madly incoherent MJO signal has meant vast amounts of warm tropical air pooling in Indonesian longitudes. The CS has been insanely warm the last month, a huge firecracker waiting to go off, but with the lack of a coherent MJO signal to force the convective signal East into the CS, we've had to endure an almost constant inland troughy pattern and no ridging up the QLD coast.
TC Billy was the latest "spoiler" but as soon as he departed the monsoon trough was able to re-organise across the Top End into the Solomons and PNG.
Had a lovely surf yesterday in a decaying south swell/building East swell regime with light southerlies....nothing epic or even that good, but a fun bread and butter surf that hasn't been on the menu here for months.
Light SW winds here this morning and clean E swell....looks like it'll be that way till Wed when the next southerly change comes up the coast.
One more thing: the tradewind surge pushes the East Aus Current in close, flooding the coast with warm tropical water and increasing likelihood of morning land breezes.
Steve