Tuesday’s Surf – Cleaning up with some new S-SSW swell creeping in

Tuesday is looking more and more like a surf day…if you don’t mind the questionable water quality. It won’t be a great surf day…but there will be enough swell in the water to have some fun if the winds stay off of it.

In the water we are going to have a mix of W-NW wind/stormswell from this passing front…this is the energy that was set up by the W-NW winds that follow the front…and while the spread on the swell direction is 275-300 the majority of the swell will be coming in 290+. We will also have the first long-period lines from a new S-SSW swell (180-200) that will be filling in throughout the day (eventually peaking on Wednesday).



Look for the average spots to have surf in the chest-shoulder high range on Tuesday. The standout NW facing spots will have some head high and overhead surf through the morning. The standout S-SW facing spots will be in the shoulder high+ range for the morning but on inconsistent sets…look for a few bigger waves showing later in the day as the new S swell fills in a touch more.

Winds may still be a bit tweaked on Tuesday…a lot depends on how fast the backside of this front moves through (it is going pretty fast right now which is good). Right now it looks like this thing will push on overnight and we will get the high-pressure to fill in behind it. Look for light/variable winds for Santa Barbara down through most of LA County. OC and SD may still have some variable onshore texture for the morning but winds are forecast to be below 5-8 knots. If it gets cold enough (thanks to the clearing cloud cover) tonight it might set up more of a land-breeze for the morning which would knock down that onshore flow…cross your fingers that it gets a little chilly tonight.



So like I said…surfable…even a surf day for a few areas…but still with a few problems. The tide is still a bit fat (4-foot high…not that bad) early in the morning which doesn’t help us out, but there is enough sand that has been pushed around out there to let some spots take on this smaller swampthing. I will be getting up and checking it in the morning…with the swell combo in the water it warrants at least a quick surfcam check.

Here are the tides…

04/13/2010 Tuesday
03:26AM LDT 0.1 L
09:24AM LDT 4.0 H
03:10PM LDT 0.9 L
09:11PM LDT 5.3 H