Major flooding hits Lismore

Friday May 22 2009

Combine a strong inland upper low, deep offshore trough, blocking high in the Tasman and multiple small scale lows impacting the coast and you’ve got a recipe for a nasty severe weather outbreak on the North Coast of NSW. This powerful system was forecast days in advance to bring violent winds and major flooding to SE QLD and NE NSW, and the weather models certainly got it right. From Tuesday May 19th through to Saturday May 23rd, flooding and destructive winds lashed the region, leading to areas from the Sunshine Coast in QLD down to the Mid North Coast of NSW being declared natural disaster zones. Closer to my home, 3 small scale lows crossed the coast nearby over a 24 hour period and resulted in winds in excess of 130 km/hr and major flooding of the Wilsons River in Lismore.

On Friday May 22nd, the river peaked in Lismore at 10.38m with major flooding. It was the highest peak since the February 2001 flood, and due to the since constructed levee, saw the Lismore CBD saved from inundation by a mere 27cm. My brother and I went into Lismore to check out the flooding on the Friday morning.

         

While the levee maintained, many parts of Lismore were inundated by the floodwaters, with hundreds forced to evacuate. Below is a short video my brother filmed as we took a look around the town just prior to the river peaking.

Packing a surprising punch

Monday March 16 2009

Wow, it’s been almost 3 months since I’ve been on a storm chase. While today didn’t quite match the awesome show I saw on my last storm chase on December 30 last year, it did pack a surprising punch. Things looked really messy visually and on radar, so after stopping for a look at Tregeagle I headed back towards home. As I arrived home, it was obvious the cell was beginning to strengthen, with scud clouds developing and being lifted into an ominous, very green base. I continued east trying to stay ahead, eventually stopping at Teven as the storm was just hitting. I grabbed one quick shot of the amazing green sky before torrential rain and wild winds hit. The heavy rain and winds were soon followed by sporadic, pea sized hail. Not much lightning though!

   

I was just about to turn the video cam off when some CGs began hitting very close by. Then while taking video I saw a hailstone bounce into the grass that looked roughly golf ball size – landing where I could no longer see it! I thought I was seeing things but sure enough, a very loud ‘bang’ rang through my car as another large stone hit. Suddenly I was being pelted with 2-3cm hailstones as lightning strikes continued to pound around my car with impressive frequency. While the show was visually a bit dull, the intensity of the storm sure caught me off guard. Radar later revealed the storm had very rapidly intensified right over the Alstonville/Ballina area, so I was lucky to see what I did. Will it be the last hoorah for the 2008/09 storm season?

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