STORM LASHES SYDNEY

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 765, 11 September 1929, Page 9

STORM LASHES SYDNEY

SIX PERSONS BADLY INJURED HIGH SEAS IN THE TASMAN Heed. 10 a.m. SYDNEY, Today. Antarctic cold, a howling gale, driving rain, and a wind-lashed sea were Sydney’s lot throughout last night, and these conditions are continuing this morning. Vessels are sheltering along the coast. Mountainous seas are reported to be running in the Tasman. The blinding squalls in the city were responsible for many motor accidents. Six people were seriously injured, and sent to hospital. Many small boats in the harbour were swamped, and houses and sheds were unroofed in the suburbs. The wind reached a velocity of 50 miles an hour. Snow fell in some parts of Sydney yesterday afternoon — an almost unprecedented occurrence. Rain fell in a deluge along the coast, and flood warnings were issued to farmers. Snow caused a fire which fused electric wires, and plunged practically the whole of the larger towns on the Blue Mountains into darkness. The snow weighed so heavily on the limb of a tree in Katoomba that the limb fell across the electric wires, -which came into contact with telephone wires. A transformer box burst into flames, and the electric lights failed immediately. The snow in some places was the heaviest for 30 years.