It lasted barely two minutes but felt “like a typhoon” when 100km/h winds tore through the Hunter Valley town of Kurri Kurri in New South Wales, Australia. Dozens of buildings on the main street were badly damaged with the town library, pub and public school bearing the brunt as the ferocious storm hit at about 2 p.m.
Two women were rescued by police after being trapped when the roof of the library collapsed. The pair was taken to Maitland Hospital with minor injuries.
A lightning strike ripped a hole in the roof of the Kurri Kurri Hotel and did it so rapidly that patrons didn’t even have time to get off their bar stools. “It happened really quickly, the chimney blew over. It’s a heritage building so it’s going to be really hard to get it back to what it was,” Jim Sullivan, the pub manager said, describing the storm as a mini typhoon.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Mark Roberts. “There were hailstones coming in. You could barely see out the window.”
Cheryl Baker said the whole town was “devastated” by the “flash storm” which brought trees and power lines down. “Washing machines and dryers from the second-hand shop got picked up and have been flying down the road with the storm,” she said. “There are trees down on cars and it is raining really heavy. The lightning struck the pub and there is now a hole in its roof. The library roof has also fallen onto the power lines over the Centrelink building,” she continued. We’ve got no electricity at all.”
The roof of the ambulance hall, which housed an after school childminding service, was ripped off, while at Kurri Kurri Public School huge trees came down and the playground was covered in debris.
Central Hunter Police Superintendent Craig Jackson described the storm as “two intense minutes” that struck the town without warning. “The storm has taken roofs of various businesses in the town centre of Kurri, taken off awnings and we’ve had two women rescued from a partially collapsed building,” Supt. Jackson said.
“It’s one of the more powerful storms I’ve seen, there is quite a lot of damage. There was no warning for the intensity. It has taken everyone by surprise. Between the emergency services, it’s going to be a busy night.”
At the height of the storm, there were almost 2300 homes without power in Kurri Kurri, Weston and Mulbring. State Emergency Service spokeswoman Sue Pritchard said the SES had close to 100 calls for help in the Kurri Kurri area. “There are so many jobs but the worst has been roofs of houses, an office block affected, leaking roofs, fences down on driveways and generally quite a lot of damage,” she said.
The SES responded to 500 calls for assistance across NSW. Illawarra recorded up to 150mm of drenching rain and Sydney had 70mm. Hail the size of golf balls fell at Narrabri, and 10cm of snow was recorded at Perisher.
Speaking of the plagues meted out to Pharaoh and Egypt before the deliverance of the Israelites, we read in Patriarchs and Prophets, page 269, that “The storm came as predicted—thunder and hail, and fire mingled with it, very grievous, such as there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation. And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt all that was in the field, both man and beast; and the hail smote every herb of the field, and brake every tree of the field.” “Ruin and desolation marked the path of the destroying angel. The land of Goshen alone was spared. It was demonstrated to the Egyptians that the earth is under the control of the living God, that the elements obey His voice, and that the only safety is in obedience to Him.”
Perhaps the storm at Kurri Kurri is a warning to the rest of Australia.
Source References
Sydney weather: Hail, storms, snow and 150mm of rain as NSW cops soaking