Severe thunderstorms and heavy rain are expected to continue to batter the east coast until at least Wednesday evening, as thousands of households remained without power on Boxing Day.
Severe weather warnings have been issued for large parts of the New South Wales, Victorian and Queensland coasts, covering metropolitan areas as well as some regional areas.
Two women were reported missing on Tuesday afternoon in flood waters in Gympie, 170km north of Brisbane. Police have launched a search and rescue operation to find them.
Emergency services were called to the Kidd Bridge around 3.20pm after reports three women had become stuck in flood waters near the Mary river. One woman was rescued with non-life threatening injuries, while the other two remained missing.
The wild weather has affected much of the east coast. The Bureau of Meteorology issued a warning for giant hail in the Hunter region in NSW, with a humid and unstable air mass alongside a trough bringing thunderstorms.
Four-centimetre hailstones were reported at Rutherford, near Newcastle, on Tuesday afternoon, with further hail expected overnight across the Maitland, Cessnock and Greater Newcastle regions.
The storms are also likely to bring damaging winds and heavy rainfall that may cause flash flooding as the systems move southwards, towards Sydney.
Flood warnings have also been issued for the South Coast and the Snowy River, with catchments along the Moruya, Deua, Tuross and Towamba rivers likely to be affected.
Angus Hines, a senior meteorologist at the weather bureau, said the risk of severe thunderstorms heading into Tuesday night was “fairly extensive”.
“And stretches all the way from the central and northern parts of the Queensland coast, down through Brisbane, across much of eastern NSW and around central and eastern Victoria as well.”
Hines said Queensland will probably be most affected by the storms on Tuesday night, adding that central and northern parts of the coast could be hit by thunderstorms on Wednesday too.
“Across a large area of Queensland, it’s likely to be another stormy one with severe thunderstorms possible, more damaging winds, large to giant hail and areas of heavy rain all a possibility.”
A severe thunderstorm warning was issued for the Gold Coast, Brisbane, Maroochydore, Gympie, Ipswich and Mount Morgan for Tuesday evening, with BoM warning of damaging winds, large hailstones and heavy rainfall that may lead to flash flooding.
Flood warnings were also issued for the Logan, Moonie, Paroo and Lower Barcoo rivers, and for parts of the Cape York Peninsula.
Thousands without power after ‘mini cyclone’
More than 120,000 people were without power in south-east Queensland after thunderstorms battered the region on Tuesday and pulled down power lines.
The Queensland ambulance service confirmed that a woman had died in Helensvale on the Gold Coast after being hit by a falling tree on Monday night.
Queensland’s deputy premier, Cameron Dick, described the weather as a “mini cyclone”.
“This has been unprecedented in some ways, with power poles being torn out of the ground and a concrete power pole damaged for the first time ever by a storm. That just gives you an insight to this severity and the destructive nature of the storm,” he said.
Dick said the storm had done “very significant damage” and that it would take “some time” before power was restored.
“There’s been hundreds of thousands of lightning strikes and that’s done very significant damage to our energy and power network across the south-east,” he said.
“It’s going to take some time … to put that power system back together and to get the power back on. But we’re just asking all Queenslanders impacted by this to stay safe first of all, and to be calm and patient.”
The BoM also issued severe thunderstorm warnings across Gippsland and Victoria’s central and north-central forecast districts, with warnings of intense rainfall that may lead to dangerous flash flooding.
Victoria police confirmed a man died at a property in Caringal after a tree branch fell on him on Tuesday morning.
“Emergency services provided medical assistance, however the yet-to-be formally identified man died at the scene,” police said in a statement.
Flood warnings have been issued for the Werribee, Goulburn, Loddon and Avoca Rivers, with heavy rainfall expected to continue into Wednesday.
Conditions are expected to ease later in the week, with the storms expected to pass most of the east coast by Wednesday afternoon.
