More than 20 people rescued from floodwaters as thunderstorm lashes Sydney
Fixed-line internet customers of TPG, Vodafone, iiNet, Internode and Kogan suffered from a 4.5-hour-long weather-related outage starting about 5.30pm on Monday.
Services began to return to normal just after 10pm AEDT on Monday, some customers reported, while others continued to experience issues.
The storm rolling toward Sydney this morning.Credit: Radar Storm Pro
A TPG spokesperson confirmed the cause of the incident was a storm-related power outage that hit one of its data centres. A subsequent generator failure caused disruption to TPG’s consumer and business customers.
“Connectivity is being gradually restored for customers, although some business platforms continue to be affected. We are working on restoring all services as soon as possible,” the spokesperson said. “We apologise for any inconvenience this has caused customers and thank them for their patience.”
The SES received more than 300 callouts after the storm. More than 550 incidents were reported across NSW overnight Sunday and into Monday.
The storm also left Sydney’s public transport on its knees. Light rail services on the L2 Randwick and L3 Kingsford Line were closed due to flooding. Flooding at Strathfield railway station also led to delays across multiple train lines.
The Bureau of Meteorology is predicting the chance of less severe thunderstorms on Tuesday before conditions ease on Wednesday.
The bureau warned that Gosford, Sydney, Orange, Katoomba, Dubbo and Parkes were of particular concern.
“I think everyone will be copping a bit of weather today,” the bureau’s Helen Reid said.
Early on Monday morning, the storm dumped an extraordinary amount of hail onto Harden, a small town near Cootamundra, leaving it blanketed with a layer of ice. Shops and homes were flooded, windows were smashed and wildlife found injured.
Hail blanketed Harden in regional NSW.Credit: Ashleigh Messner
An animal ambulance was deployed from Sydney to treat multiple wild birds left seriously injured from the hail. The SES responded to more than 120 callouts in the town.
The thunderstorms are forming on a surface trough in a moist, unstable air mass in inland NSW, with an upper trough moving them across the state towards the coast.
with Ben Grubb
