Depressions Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright folks, Rusty here. Gonna be real with you about Depressions. This stretch is a tough one, no two ways about it. The forecast is a long, flat grind with barely a ripple worth paddling for across the entire 16-day window. We're talking a lot of days where the best you'll get is a marginal knee-high bump, and most of the time even that is blown out or messy. The overall wave energy is pretty weak for the most part, with only a few pulses that get into the moderate range but never really deliver clean surf.

Alright, let's wade through the muck. The first real chance of something surfable pops up on Thursday, 27th August. The afternoon session is where it's at. There's a tiny 2ft swell pushing in from the S, with a period of 11 seconds, so it's a little long-period groundswell. The real winner here is the wind going glassy. That means the water will be like a mirror, which is a massive positive for these small conditions. The combined energy is moderate at (261). It won't be epic, but for a stand-alone moment it's about as good as it gets in this outlook.

Friday, 28th August tries to build, with the morning showing a 4ft swell from the WNW, but it's an 8-second windswell period which is junk. The energy is moderate (315), but the quality is poor. The afternoon turns into a messy 7ft chunky windswell with a pathetic 6-second period and a cross-onshore breeze. That's too big and crumbly for the fun police. Honestly, if you see that 7ft and 6 seconds, it’s more of a kite-surfing setup than a paddle session.

After that, the rest of the first week and into the second week is just a series of "poor" and "marginal" tags. There's a persistent run of SSW swells from the 30th of August right through to September 6th, but they hover around 2ft to 3ft. The combined energy occasionally spikes up to (565) on the 29th, and (524) on the 30th, which sounds significant until you see the wind is all wrong. Strong cross-onshore winds ruin any chance of those swells holding up.

Into the second week, things go completely flat. You are looking at a solid gap from around the 5th of September onward where conditions are just dead. The waves shrink to 1ft - 2ft, and the energy drops off a cliff. From the 7th of September through the 9th, it's a wasteland of tiny, poor, and poorly-directed energy.

So there are no true standouts. The only flicker of light in the tunnel is that Thursday afternoon window. The rest of the time, you’re better off finding something else to do. The water temp anomaly is wild though – a massive 4° warmer than normal at the start of the period, which is very unusual. So at least you can have a warm bath while you’re sitting there.

Hang in there, it often doesn't stay this poor for long.

Stay salty,
Rusty

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