Rawson tide times

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived.

Model-derived from a global ocean grid. Useful indication; expect about ±45 minutes on average vs. a local harmonic gauge, individual stations vary widely. See /methodology for per-region detail. Not for navigation.

Conditions as of 01:00 local time. Refreshes daily.

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived. · Not for navigation.

The angler tradition for major/minor fishing windows: major ≈3-hour windows around moon transit and opposition; minor ≈2-hour windows around moonrise and moonset. Times are America/Argentina/Buenos Aires local. Folk tradition, not a scientific forecast.

Next spring tide on Tue 19 May (range 4.7m). Last neap on Fri 15 May. Next neap on Thu 21 May.

Spring tides cluster around new and full moons (biggest swings). Neap tides land on quarter moons (smallest swings). See the spring tide and neap tide glossary entries for the why.

Rawson is the provincial capital of Chubut, sitting at the mouth of the Chubut River where it meets the South Atlantic approximately 65 km south of Puerto Madryn. The tidal regime here is the same macrotidal Patagonian system — mean range approximately 5.5 m, semidiurnal, two complete cycles per day — but the river mouth adds a dynamic absent from the open-gulf ports to the north. The Chubut River carries freshwater and sediment down from the Andean precordillera; at the estuary, the tide drives salt water up the river on the flood and pulls it back on the ebb, creating the brackish mixing zone typical of macrotidal river mouths. The tidal prism in the Chubut estuary is large enough that the ebb current runs fast in the river channel — a significant consideration for small boats navigating the approach to the Rawson harbour. The Toninas (Franciscana dolphins, Pontoporia blainvillei) — one of the rarest small cetaceans in the world, critically endangered — are present in the coastal zone around Rawson, and a dolphin-watching operation has operated from the harbour for several decades. The Playa Unión beach resort area lies immediately south of the harbour mouth, where the coast opens onto a wide sandy beach backed by low dunes; the beach is widest at low water when the full intertidal is exposed, and the town road from Rawson to Playa Unión crosses the river just inside the harbour. Punta Tombo, 100 km south of Rawson near Camarones, hosts the world's largest Magellanic penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus) colony — approximately one million birds return each spring from September through March. The colony is accessible by day trip from Rawson or Trelew (40 km inland). The Servicio de Hidrografía Naval (SHN) is the authoritative source for tidal predictions at Rawson; Open-Meteo Marine supplements with gridded model data accurate to approximately ±45 minutes on timing and ±0.2–0.3 m on height.