Topic: NSW Coastal Showers, Storms, Flash Floods and Waterspouts : 2 - 4 May 2009

[Michael Bath]

Some scattered showers and isolated thunderstorm developed yesterday in response to an upper low. Quite a few reports of waterspouts or funnels with a terrific photo by James Harris.

http://sydneystormchasers.com/system/files/images/09-05-02-01jh.jpg

It appears a strong waterspout made landfall at The Entrance

Police say three women have been injured when a water funnel or mini-tornado lifted a caravan on the New South Wales central coast on Saturday afternoon.

Officers say the mini-tornado tore through a caravan park at The Entrance about 3:00pm and dumped one of the caravans in a nearby lagoon.

Three women staying at the park have been taken to Gosford Hospital, one with a broken arm and the others with cuts and bruises.

- ABC

source


Radar shows plenty of showers and some thunderstorm off the coast from, Sydney northwards.

[Michael Bath]

Have received reports of waterspouts off Byron Bay and Lennox Head this afternoon - probably from the same cell.
The local paper should have a photo tomorrow.

[Jimmy Deguara]

From Nikolaos,

-----------------
I saw three funnel clouds this morning off the east coast, Sydney.  The first one was just south of maroubra beach @ 8:10am, the vortex made its way about half way down - did not reach the sea.  The second two were seen at 8:34am further south just outside kurnell puninshula, one was quite large, the other quite small, neither made it down to the sea.  Conditions were slight to moderate southerly breeze, heavy cloud above, sea temp somewhere @ 21C.  Event lasted only a few minutes for all three.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Antonio (stormboy)]

i was at lennox beach this afternoon and there was a twin waterspout/funnel but i had no camera here is a radar for 11pm today some heavy rain within the box

[Richary]

Interesting, I flew from Sydney to Adelaide yesterday leaving home about 9:30am. I noticed a couple of quite impressive cumulus anvils off the coast as the taxi was taking me to the airport. The flight was delayed and by the time we took off about 12:30pm all that was visible was scattered cloud.

[Michael Bath]

Report of the flash flooding at Coogee on Saturday evening from Sydney Morning Herald:

http://www.smh.com.au/environment/surfs-up-at-coogee-x2026-but-its-cars-that-are-getting-dumped-20090503-argl.html


and from the Daily Telegraph - which also includes some footage of the flooding and tornado at The Entrance.

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,,25421735-5001021,00.html

and news item from Weatherzone

On Saturday storms battered parts of eastern Sydney whilst much of the rest of the city remained almost bone dry.

The bright sunny skies of Saturday morning lulled many into leaving their umbrellas at home, indeed there was little evidence of the upper trough lingering ominously offshore. As things warmed up however and the trough moved landward, clouds began to build signaling that something may be afoot.

By 2.30pm clusters of storms began sparking offshore, one south of Wollongong and another just out from The Entrance. By 3pm rain was falling along parts of the coast and a tornado had struck The Entrance.

It wasn't until about 7.30pm that the storms really began to move inshore. Over the next few hours most Sydneysiders were treated to an impressive lightning show, although those in the eastern suburbs would have been diving for shelter as heavy rain moved in.

In the subsequent hours to 9am on Sunday Randwick collected 77mm, their highest May total in 35 years. Mona Vale hit 57mm, Avalon 44mm, Bondi 41mm, yet the city only saw 13mm. The storms made little progress inland and anywhere west of Canterbury saw no rain whatsoever.

[Michael Bath]

Here's the waterspout off Lennox Head 3 May 2009 and associated article in today's Northern Star newspaper. Is this the same one you saw Stormboy ?

[Antonio (stormboy)]

that probably is it as in between 3 and 5pm i was at lennox area. more looking out for them today as there are huge cumulonimbus every ware and they may cause several spouts..

[Antonio (stormboy)]

wow this rain is soo heavy our whole backyard has ankle deep water sitting around as more pouring down bursts hit us.

[Michael Bath]

Some more photos of the Lennox - Byron waterspout (3rd May) have been posted - these are by Vicki of Brisbane who was lucky enough to be in the area:

http://s264.photobucket.com/albums/ii181/VickiP/?action=view&current=SaltannivarsaryMay2-4200911.jpg

http://s264.photobucket.com/albums/ii181/VickiP/?action=view&current=SaltannivarsaryMay2-4200916-1.jpg

http://s264.photobucket.com/albums/ii181/VickiP/?action=view&current=SaltannivarsaryMay2-4200918.jpg

http://s264.photobucket.com/albums/ii181/VickiP/?action=view&current=SaltannivarsaryMay2-4200921.jpg

[Antonio (stormboy)]

some more very heavy rain caused this

YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

it is being processed

[Steven]

Yeah we had some cells cross the coast, but the best we could do was about 10mm.

[enak_12]

Well no waterspouts for me unfortunately though I didn't spend much time looking I did take some shots on may 3rd of offshore storms..Tuesday may 2 was better but I was busy that night

[Michael Bath]

I've received more photos of the waterspouts on Sunday 3rd May 2009. These were taken from Lennox Head between 2.47pm and 2.52pm.




There were definitely two separate events that afternoon. The Lennox Head one which was further out to sea leading up to 3pm, and the second which was photographed by a number of people at and near Byron Bay around 4pm:






See : 128km Radar Loop for Grafton, 02:00 03/05/2009 to 07:00 03/05/2009 UTC