Severe weather warnings and flash flooding hits parts of northern NSW

Australian Community Media

Days of rain, strong wind and dangerous surf for parts of NSW.

Transcript

00:00Days of rain lie ahead for parts of eastern New South Wales which will have significant

00:05flood impacts for part of the state.

00:07Damaging winds, large waves all part of the package as well.

00:10I'm Angus Hines here at the Bureau to talk you through the latest on this unfolding

00:14severe weather situation across New South Wales which really set in overnight last night.

00:20This is the radar imagery from last night and Monday morning and as it loops through

00:23again we can see the rain moved up through Sydney last night, about 50mm in the northern

00:28suburbs, over 100mm along the central coast here but this is where the rain is now between

00:33Newcastle and Port Macquarie including over Newcastle itself and that is going to become

00:38a very key watch point, a key focus area as heavy rain is likely to persist in this part

00:44of the state, not just for the rest of the day today but for the next several days.

00:48Let's switch away from the radar which is what has already happened and we'll put on

00:52the model information which is the forecast for what is going to happen in the coming

00:56few days.

00:57As we move through Monday into Tuesday this band of rain between Newcastle and up to Port

01:01Macquarie is basically going to stay in place.

01:04Keep feeding wet weather and strong to damaging winds onto that part of the state.

01:09The accumulations are going to get significant over the coming few days and because of that

01:14we've issued a whole array of severe weather warnings.

01:17So let's dive into the warning detail because this neatly highlights the key areas which are

01:22likely to be impacted.

01:23So this is how the warning looks on the state wide scale but of course we can zoom in for

01:27a little bit more detail here.

01:29The key regions affected by the warning are the Hunter region here and the mid north coast

01:33but it also pushes up into some of the mountainous areas.

01:36The warning extends actually south of Newcastle, hard to see here but along the central coast

01:41we can see that warning run down towards the likes of Gosford.

01:45Then from Newcastle it really opens up through inland parts of the mid north coast, past Forster,

01:50Port Macquarie, Kempsey and up to Nambucca Heads.

01:54Inland as far as Scone but not quite as far as Tamworth.

01:57In this area we will see significant rainfall in the coming days.

02:00We could see 6 hour rainfall totals of 60 to 100 millimetres and over 24 hours some places

02:06could get 150, perhaps even 200 millimetres.

02:10Not just today but tomorrow or the day after as well.

02:13This warning area also covers the risk of damaging wind gusts especially around the east coast and

02:18up in the mountains and we've already seen some locations gusting over 100 kilometres

02:23through Monday morning.

02:25I'm now going to play through the rain accumulations and this once again just highlights which parts

02:30of New South Wales will be most strongly affected by this coastal trough as it dances around

02:35the coastline.

02:36I'll just drop the names away so we can see things a little bit more clearly and it really

02:40highlights the heaviest falls well and truly in excess of 150 millimetres, probably more than

02:45250 over the next few days and if we look out to Thursday we could be seeing some 300 millimetre

02:50plus totals around some of these areas in the Hunter and the mid north coast once again.

02:56Also note in this image away from the heaviest rainfall it will still be a fairly wet week

03:00for Sydney, the Illawarra, parts of the central tablelands and even up towards the northern

03:05rivers.

03:06We have got some flood warnings and flood watches which have already been issued in anticipation

03:11of the coming days of rain.

03:13Some of the rivers around the north east of the state have started to see their levels

03:16lift already but much of the river level rises are still to come, widespread minor to moderate

03:22flooding is anticipated through rivers north of Newcastle and south of Coffs Harbour over

03:26the coming few days and we're certainly not ruling out the possibility that some rivers

03:31could see major flooding if we do see days of rain on end across their catchment areas.

03:37Other wet weather impacts are expected as well, flash flooding could lead to inundation of homes,

03:42properties, businesses even away from those rivers and waterways.

03:46Dangerous driving conditions, closed roads, slow going out there for travel and transportation

03:51and when we get the wind and the rain together that's when we see trees coming down, damage

03:55to crops, potential damage to houses and power outages could occur as well.

04:00Finally, I just wanted to look at the coastal conditions because we're looking at another

04:04bout of really sizeable waves for the New South Wales coast north of Sydney.

04:08We're up in the 6 to 8 metre range for offshore areas, perhaps 5 metres by the time it touches

04:13on the coastline but that is really large, powerful conditions and that has caused a damaging

04:19surf warning to be issued.

04:21It goes from Gosford in the south up to Newcastle, Seal Rocks, Port Macquarie and Coffs Harbour.

04:25We could be seeing some very powerful ocean conditions here which could cause erosion along

04:30the coastline but of course will also make things dangerous on and near the water for

04:35things like swimming, surfing, getting out on the boat, even fishing or walking along

04:39the foreshore could be a bit treacherous.

04:41So do take care along this stretch of ocean over the next few days.

04:46These warnings and all your forecast information will be available and up to date on the Bureau's

04:50website and you can get your information through the BOM Weather app as well.

04:54Thanks for watching and stay safe.

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