No let up as rain, storms spark floods, power outages

Swathes of Australia’s east coast continue to be lashed by wild weather heading south.

Thunderstorms are headed for central Victoria on Wednesday before becoming widespread over the eastern half of the state.

There is potential for heavy falls, large hail and damaging winds, the Bureau of Meteorology says.

Melbourne can expect showers and likely a thunderstorm, possibly severe.

Lightning stopped flights at the city’s airport on Tuesday evening and almost 50,000 homes and businesses across the state were without power.

Homes have been damaged by heavy rain and winds that have uprooted trees. (Dave Hunt/AAP PHOTOS)

One of the state’s major energy providers, Powercor, said there were more than 90,000 lightning strikes during the past 24 hours and it was still working to reconnect power to 2400 homes.

Most are expected to have power restored on Wednesday but Powercor said it was likely some properties would remain without power overnight.

There were 7600 customers with AusNet, supplies power to power to all the state’s east, southeast and much of the north, still without power on Wednesday afternoon.

Police have urged people not to drive in floodwaters after a man and his dog were swept away in fast-moving water in the state’s north.

The 60-year-old man had driven into floodwaters on Tuesday and was rescued by emergency services. He was taken to hospital for observation and escaped injury.

The bureau says the worst of the wild weather has moved on in Queensland but isolated showers and thunderstorms are likely across most of the state on Wednesday.

Australian Defence Force troops have been deployed across the state to help with recovery efforts while authorities continue work to restore power to about 8000 homes.

Queensland’s southeast faces the prospect of more rain and thunderstorms. (Dave Hunt/AAP PHOTOS)

Authorities were hoping to get power restored by Friday but Queensland Police Assistant Commissioner Ben Marcus said it’s more likely to be completed at the weekend.

“That’s effectively because we lost a couple of days due to wet weather,” he said.

“We’re not talking one or two power poles, we’re talking hundreds and hundreds so it will take quite a long time to restore that.”

There are about 15,000 NBN services offline, mostly related to the power outages.

Federal Emergency Management Minister Murray Watt said compounding weather events meant the state needed more resources.

“But when we had that heavy rainfall hit as well, to compound the situation, that’s when the Defence Force was really needed.”

Hundreds of flood-damaged Queensland roads remain closed and continuing rain means an increased potential for landslides and fallen debris.

Dozens of people have been rescued from flood waters, with the SES responding to more than 5000 calls for help since Christmas Day.

Ten homes in the southeast have been destroyed by storms with 386 copping minor and 145 moderate damage.

Murray Watt says there were gaps in getting some weather bureau information out. (Jason O’BRIEN/AAP PHOTOS)

Storms and flooding in northern NSW have also kept emergency services working overtime.

A cluster of localities received more than a month’s worth of rain in the 48 hours to Tuesday evening, some centres in the Northern Rivers region copping falls of more than 500mm.

The SES said local crews had completed 28 rescues during the period.

In response to criticism of the bureau for its forecasts during Cyclone Jasper in December, Senator Watt said updates and warnings were provided in the lead-up to flooding and storms but it was hoped to improve emergency text alerts more generally sent out by councils.

“There was a bit of a gap between some of the information the bureau was providing and that information getting out,” he said on Wednesday.