Fire busting rain brings new threat
Heavy rain has officially extinguished the mammoth Currowan fire on the NSW South Coast 74 days after it started and emergency services have now turned their concerns to predictions of flash flooding and coastal erosion along the east coast.
A low pressure trough is deepening as it moves down the coast and has combined with strong winds between Nobbys Head at Newcastle and the Royal National Park south of Sydney to produce dangerous surf conditions and wild weather.
The NSW Bureau of Meteorology were foreshadowing the biggest rainfall event in decades if the falls predicted for yesterday eventuated. The highest recorded fall for Sydney over the last 24 hours was 98 millimetres at Sydney Olympic Park.
The State Emergency Service issued flood warnings for the Hawkesbury-Nepean catchment and parts of the South Coast, and severe weather warnings for the
Sydney metropolitan area, Illawarra and parts of Mid North Coast, Hunter, South Coast, Central Tablelands and Southern Tablelands.
Cudgera Creek in the Tweed Shire recorded the highest fall over the last 24 hours, with 320mm of rain, followed by Kingscliff which recorded more than 250mm. In Sydney, Sydney Olympic Park received 98mm of rain and Wahroonga recorded 96mm.
The NSW Rural Fire Service announced on Saturday night that the Currowan Fire, which destroyed 312 homes and claimed three lives, was extinguished. The fire began in the Currowan State Forest north of Batemans Bay on November 26 and burned through just under 500,000 hectares, attacking South Coast towns and spreading north to the Southern Highlands and west towards Queanbeyan.
In the Blue Mountains, Wentworth Falls recorded 180mm, but areas around Newnes on the western side of the range received much less rain, and the Gospers Mountain fire is still listed at advice level.
The rain is already causing havoc with transport, with Sydney Trains carrying out ‘‘urgent infrastructure repairs’’ at Central Station.
The last time more than 300mm of rain was recorded in a single rainfall event in Sydney was February 1992, but Bureau of Meteorology duty forecaster Helen Kirkup said this measure had not yet been met. ‘‘The thing with this one is that it’s actually quite widespread, because there’s a big part of the coast getting big falls,’’ Kirkup said.
‘‘Some of the previous east coast falls have been targeted one part of the coast or another.’’
The drought affected inland had received patchy rain, with storms delivering high rainfall to some areas but nothing to others. Inverell received 100mm over the last 24 hours and Tamworth 30-50mm, but Walgett had only received 8mm. – Nine