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Worst flooding in decades continues for eastern Australia

By Adam Douty, AccuWeather senior meteorologist & Maura Kelly, AccuWeather meteorologist

Updated Mar 24, 2021 3:37 PM EDT

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Residents of Taree, Australia, are sleeping in the same auditorium that served as a shelter during bushfires a year ago as catastrophic flooding hits the area.

The Australian government has declared a natural disaster across portions of New South Wales as torrential rainfall inundates the region.

One man died on Wednesday after his car became stuck in floodwaters to the north and west of Sydney.

More than 18,000 people have been forced to evacuate their homes in New South Wales since heavy rainfall arrived late last week, according to CNN.

"Communities who were battered by the bushfires are now being battered by the floods and a deep drought prior to that. I don't know any time in our state's history where we've had these extreme weather conditions in such quick succession in the middle of a pandemic," said NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian.

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During late 2019 and early 2020, AccuWeather estimated that bushfires across New South Wales and Victoria caused $110 billion in total damages and economic losses.

The heavy rainfall across the region is causing delays in the delivery of coronavirus vaccines ahead of the rollout of the Phase 1B. However, according to Australia's ABC News, the five metropolitan vaccination hubs in New South Wales remained open on Monday as the state moved into the next phase of vaccinations.

The map shows the amount of rain that fell across New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory from Tuesday, March 16 to Monday March 22, with some of the highest rainfall totals (blues and purples) occurring along the coast of New South Wales. (BOM)

Justin Robinson, the national flood services manager at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, told CNN, "I've been a flood forecaster in the Bureau for 20 years and this is probably the worst flooding that I've experienced and have had to forecast."

According to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, in excess of 400 mm (16 inches) of rain has fallen along the northern New South Wales coast during the last seven days.

New South Wales Flooding
Twitter

Port Macquarie is one area that has been hard hit with rainfall as totals reached 200-300 mm (8-12 inches) in just 24 hours from Friday into Saturday. Since Thursday, a total of 455 mm (17.9 inches) of rain has fallen. Water quickly collected in low-lying areas across the coastal town with reports of floodwaters reaching up to door handles in some locations.

At North Tamborine, Queensland, 505 mm (19.88 inches) of rain fell in just 48 hours from Sunday to Tuesday.

"This is nothing like we've seen since the 1960s," said state Premier Gladys Berejiklian at a news conference over the weekend. According to CNN, for some of the hardest-hit areas this is a once-in-a-century flooding event.

Across New South Wales on Monday and Tuesday, in excess of 150 schools closed due to flooding.

#NSWFloods

Before/after imagery showing the latest inundation in the Mid North Coast #NSW

- #Taree
- #PortMacquarie

- Latest imagery this morning: 06:07:20 AEDT, 2021-03-20
- Previous imagery: 06:06:55 AEDT, 2021-03-08
- Image source: sentinel-1 @CopernicusEU @sentinel_hub pic.twitter.com/sdjjpDv520

— BigData Earth (@BigDataEarth) March 20, 2021

Officials also warn that the excessive rain in recent days, and with more on the way, many dams across the region can come close to capacity with the potential for some to spill over. One such dam is the Warragamba, Sydney's major storage supply, which was at 97.5% capacity on Friday. On Saturday, water began to spill over the top of the Warragamba Dam.

While on Sunday, the Warragamba Dam released about 500 gigaliters of water, according to WaterNSW, by Monday this amount was lowered to 300 gigaliters.

As if the flooding was not enough, images in flooded areas now show hoards of spiders floating atop the floodwaters.

My hometown is flooding right now. And for those who wonder if there’s really a lot of spiders in Australia. See the brown in this pic? That’s all spiders trying to escape the flood pic.twitter.com/dk8ydGmHwg

— Matt 🇦🇺 Ω (@MG___214) March 22, 2021

As rescue and recovery efforts continue through the end of the week, a drier pattern will emerge over New South Wales, allowing water levels to begin trending toward normal over the region. The one exception being eastern Victoria where heavy rain will continue through Tuesday night.

Related:

Daily coronavirus briefing
Trillions of lightning bolts may have jumpstarted life on Earth
Aerial video captures devastating scale of Australian floods

Heavy rain first arrived across Queensland in northeastern Australia earlier in the week.

During a 24-hour period leading up to Wednesday morning, 550 mm (21.65 inches) of rain inundated the coastal community of Byfield, Queensland.

Water level gauge for Retreat Creek as Sapphire shows the rapid 9-meter rise in water levels on Wednesday. The creek crested at 9.60 meters (31.50 feet) on Wednesday morning, according to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology.

Farther inland, 216 mm (8.50 inches) of rain in 24 hours led to flash flooding in Sapphire, Queensland, when waters in Retreat Creek rose about 9 meters (nearly 30 feet) within a few hours early on Wednesday.

Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier, Spectrum, FuboTV, Philo, and Verizon Fios.

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