Australian Severe Weather Forum

Glen Innes storms leave damage trail
Storms which swept through northern new South Wales sparked minor bushfires and damaged businesses in the Glen Innes shopping precinct.

A total of 52 millimetres of rain and hail fell in the Grey Street area of Glen Innes, flooding four shops and causing at least one to suffer a partially collapsed roof.

Hail was thick near schools, preventing children from getting onto buses until it was shovelled away.

Another storm dropped 85mm of rain near Armidale.

One property owner, Matthew Martell, says the storm also brought up to 7.6 centimetres of hail, some the size of golf balls.

"It's done a fair bit of damage, it's washed out fences. I got bad hail damage in the Land Cruiser I was sitting in. While I was sitting in that it was shaking the Toyota sideways," he said.

Dry lightning storms and high winds sparked small bushfires in the Tamworth and Tingha district and caused some concern for firefighters battling the large blazes in the Mount Kaputar and Pilliga areas.

Storm sends shopping trolleys flying
A storm that swept through western New South Wales overnight caused significant damage in Cobar.

Police say about 6:20pm AEDT yesterday, two shopping trolleys were blown across Linsley Street and then onto the roof of the motel units at the rear of the Great Western Hotel.

As a result, several corrugated iron sheets ripped from the roof of 10 of the 19 units.

Some of the roof material then landed in the car park, damaging six cars and some also came to rest on the roof of a nearby building.

No-one was injured.

Crews from the police, fire brigade, State Emergency Service, ambulance service and Cobar Shire Council worked late into the night to put tarpaulins on the roof and clean up the scene.

What do you think about the shopping trolleys? Dry Micro Burst? Mini tornado? Or maybe a couple of drunks on there way home from the local hotel?!