AN ECCENTRIC SPRING

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 29, 29 October 1918, Page 4

AN ECCENTRIC SPRING

VIOLENT ELECTRIC STORM. ( Labour Day will lons be remembered in Wellington lor the vagaries of the weather. - The day dawned as fair as the most pessimistic picnicker could desire, and sunshine ruled the day until car y in the afternoon, when the north-westerly breeze piped up cold and blustery, raining the dust in clouds and flipping the hats from tho heads of unwary pe**I'trians in. a most unruly fashion. Ihe sky became overcast at ti p.m., and in-, creased in blackness until rain lell at I,first, in short showers. At about iM n m the dome of blackness overhead was solit by ii long, jagged electric name, and that wns immediately followed by a roar of thunder, which! brought, in vto train a flooding downpour of the heaviest rain Then followed an amazingly vivitt dispiay of lightning, and terriuc thunderclaps which appeared to have their • genesis immediately overhead. At i.au two claps of thunder resembled the firing of heavy artillery at a distance of a few hundred feet, and ono crash at S.d D, seemed as though the vaa happening at really close quarters, and buildings in tho centre o the ct y nrhiallv trembled with the force ot we coSon! Whilst the lightning flashed and the thunder crashed, the lam fell in torrents and flooded the streets o the . citv temporarily, but, so far as could Dβ ffirffid, without doing any «™» damage. The hillside streets became tor- , rents of mingled Hood water and rushin" s hin«le As usual, the macadam was 3« from Boulcott Street and borne rieht down Willis Street to lie in hoals ?nd islands at tho corner of Mercer and Willis Streets. Such was the force fibe water that ra«h«l and steeper end of Boulcott Stieet that metal from the road was torn up and canied dmra Plimmer-s Steps to ttw beside Barretts Hotel. Tanibton Quay became a succession oflakes for nearly an hour; water covered he Ml width of Customhouse Quay beshinele where had been clean, smooth ?„? *i. . ir-» «f Ml" »«*■' '» their clear, cool gleam. :