Harbour conditions

Wind, sea, tide and current on the harbour right now, and the coastal stations that see a change first.

After a mooring, a marina or a ramp? The harbour guide has Transport for NSW's public moorings, marinas and boat ramps, and the moorings a spectator can watch the racing from.

Latest reading 14:50 on 24 October 2026, as logged when this page was built.

Live readings appear here when the page can reach the club's harbour logger. Until then, the cards show the last reading logged when this page was built, and the harbour observations page has the live ones.

Wind on the harbour

• the current, the way it sets, longer the stronger
• the sea at the Heads, the way it runs, longer the higher
• under 5 knots
• 5 to 10 knots
• 10 to 15 knots
• 15 to 20 knots
• 20 to 25 knots
• 25 knots and over

Ten minute mean in knots, the gust, and the direction the wind comes from, relative to true north; the arrow flies with it. The line is the last six hours, mean and gust, with the direction at each reading along the bottom. The gust is the highest three second average in the sample, and the Port Authority's own note on it is that gusts "may be 40% high".

The shore matters as much as the forecast. Manns Point and Berry Island are 350 m apart, on Greenwich Point and at Wollstonecraft, yet in a north-easter or an easterly the club's log usually has Berry Island at half of Manns Point or less: the same wind over two shores. Read the station on your water.

• Fort Denison

  mid harbour, south end of the fort

  Last logged 9.2 kn, gusts 12.7 kn, from 74°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Western Wedding Cake

  the entrance, off Watsons Bay

  Last logged 13.8 kn, gusts 18.0 kn, from 27°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Manns Point

  Greenwich, Lane Cove River

  Last logged 7.9 kn, gusts 14.7 kn, from 53°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Berry Island

  Wollstonecraft

  Last logged 2.6 kn, gusts 7.7 kn, from 231°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Glebe Island

  west of the bridge

  Last logged 16.7 kn, gusts 18.7 kn, from 69°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

Tide and current

The tide is the measured height at Fort Denison, not the prediction: in the Port Authority's own notes the heights are to chart datum, 0.925 m below Australian Height Datum, and a measured level can differ a good deal from the predicted one. The second gauge is Manly Hydraulics Laboratory's at HMAS Penguin on Middle Head, the reference gauge for the NSW tide predictions, on the same datum, with how far the water sits above or below its prediction. The next turns are worked out from the Tide model by Open-Meteo.com, CC BY 4.0, timed and scaled against the gauge over the last two days; not the official tide table. The current is the average speed between 3 and 12 metres down and the direction it sets towards, which the Port Authority gives relative to magnetic north. Both lines are the last twelve hours; the arrows under the current show where it was setting.

• Fort Denison tide

  measured height

  Last logged 0.53 m measured height, at 14:48 on 24 October 2026.

• Sydney, HMAS Penguin

  MHL tide gauge, Middle Head

  Last logged 0.49 m measured height, at 14:30 on 24 October 2026.

• Balls Head current

  west of the bridge

  Last logged 0.3 kn, setting W, at 14:48 on 24 October 2026.

Sea state at the Heads

Significant wave height, Hs, is the average of the highest third of the waves. Hmax is the biggest wave in the sample and the period is the time between the main waves. The direction is the one the dominant waves come from, relative to true north, as the Port Authority defines it. The line is the last twelve hours, with that direction along the bottom.

• Sydney Heads

  entrance channel

  Last logged Hs 0.51 m, Hmax 0.80 m, period 7.8 s, from 76°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

Coming up the coast

A southerly change reaches Port Kembla before Botany Bay, and Botany Bay before the Heads. Watch these when a change is forecast. The barometer sees further: a steady fall ahead of a change and a jump as it passes are what to watch for.

• Sydney Airport pressure

  QNH from the aviation report

  Waiting for readings.

• Port Kembla

  VTS tower, about 80 km south

  Last logged 7.5 kn, gusts 11.3 kn, from 23°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Port Kembla breakwater

  eastern breakwater

  Last logged 8.3 kn, gusts 9.7 kn, from 19°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Kurnell

  Ampol Wharf, Botany Bay

  Last logged 15.6 kn, gusts 18.0 kn, from 71°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Molineaux Point

  Port Botany

  Last logged 10.9 kn, gusts 17.0 kn, from 58°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Sydney Airport

  main runway

  Last logged 13.8 kn, gusts 16.3 kn, from 68°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

Coming down the coast

Newcastle is about 115 km north of the Heads. A north-easter or a northerly already blowing there is on its way down the coast, past Norah Head and Gosford to North Head; most changes come up the coast, so this is the section for the days the wind is in the north. Newcastle's stations are the Port Authority's; Norah Head, Gosford and North Head are the Bureau of Meteorology's, ten minute means, logged every ten minutes.

• Nobbys Head

  Newcastle headland, about 115 km north

  Last logged 20.5 kn, gusts 22.2 kn, from 70°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Kooragang

  inside Newcastle harbour

  Last logged 9.4 kn, gusts 16.8 kn, from 86°, at 14:50 on 24 October 2026.

• Norah Head

  Central Coast headland, about 60 km north

  Last logged 9.0 kn, gusts 11.0 kn, from 55°, 22.6°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• Gosford

  Brisbane Water, about 45 km north

  Last logged 9.0 kn, gusts 12.0 kn, from 79°, 24.8°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• North Head

  the Heads, 90 m up

  Last logged 10.0 kn, gusts 14.0 kn, from 38°, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

Coming from out west

A westerly, or the land breeze on a still morning, is at Penrith and Richmond before Horsley Park, and at Horsley Park before Olympic Park and the harbour. On a hot day the inland temperature says how hard the sea breeze will come in from the Heads the other way. These are the Bureau of Meteorology's stations, ten minute means, logged every ten minutes.

Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors, under the Open Database Licence.

• Penrith

  foot of the Blue Mountains, about 50 km west

  Last logged 4.0 kn, gusts 6.0 kn, from 45°, 29.2°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• Richmond

  Hawkesbury, about 50 km north-west

  Last logged 5.0 kn, gusts 9.0 kn, from 91°, 29.2°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• Camden

  about 55 km south-west

  Last logged 8.0 kn, gusts 13.0 kn, from 3°, 29.1°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• Horsley Park

  about 35 km west

  Last logged 4.0 kn, gusts 7.0 kn, from 53°, 29.4°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

• Olympic Park

  Homebush, about 14 km west

  Last logged 10.0 kn, gusts 13.0 kn, from 92°, 27.1°C, at 14:40 on 24 October 2026.

Rain radar

Rain over the harbour and the coast in the last two hours, a frame every ten minutes, from RainViewer's composite of the Bureau of Meteorology's radars: Terrey Hills, Appin and Newcastle cover this map. Play the loop to see which way the rain is moving and how fast. The loop looks back, not ahead: for the hours to come read the chance of rain in the forecast under the harbour wind; for the Bureau's own view, with its rainfall totals, open the Bureau's Sydney (Terrey Hills) radar page.

Forecasts

Two free forecasts from elsewhere, on this page so they can be set beside the club's: the same harbour, different models. Neither is a reading, and the club makes no warranty about either.

About these readings

Source: Wave Wind Tide Current, Port Authority of NSW, which makes no warranty about these readings, and nor does the club. A reading can be late or missing; check its time before you lean on it. Not for navigation.

The club has logged every station on that page every five minutes since 20 October 2026, in a database in its own account; nothing earlier was copied. The harbour observations logger was built for the Sydney Flying Squadron by NetEvo in October 2026. The harbour observations page has all of them, twelve hours of lines, and a CSV export of any station's readings.

The stations out west, and Norah Head, Gosford and North Head on the coast, are the Bureau of Meteorology's, © Commonwealth of Australia, Bureau of Meteorology, read every ten minutes from the Bureau's observations feed; the Bureau makes no warranty about them and nor does the club.

The Sydney, HMAS Penguin gauge is Manly Hydraulics Laboratory's, © State of New South Wales (Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water), read every hour from MHL's data API. The club wrote to MHL on 23 October 2026 and shows the gauge while the answer is awaited. Its level is on the gauge's datum, zero Fort Denison, and its residual is the level less MHL's astronomical prediction; MHL makes no warranty about them and nor does the club.

The rain radar is RainViewer's composite of the Bureau of Meteorology's radars, read from RainViewer's public API only when you load it and drawn on the club's map; it is not the Bureau's radar page, and RainViewer makes no warranty about it, nor does the club. The Bureau's own page is linked beside it.

The pressure card is QNH from Sydney Airport's half-hourly aviation report, made by the Bureau of Meteorology and read every thirty minutes through the Aviation Weather Center of the US National Weather Service, which makes no warranty about it, and nor does the club. The dashed tail of its line is Open-Meteo's forecast pressure for the same point as the wind forecast above.