Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast warned for dangerous conditions in low pressure system

Gold and Sunshine Coast residents have been warned of dangerous conditions whipped up by a low pressure system.

Parts of the Gold Coast hinterland have been smashed by 100km/h “damaging” wind gusts that downed trees from the tail end of a low pressure system Sunday morning.

The weather bureau issued a severe weather warning for damaging winds near the Border Ranges for Sunday morning with a strong chance of “turbulent” gusts.

Forecaster Harry Clark said the worst of the wild weather occurred Sunday morning with the low pressure system moving offshore.

Mr Clark said radars on the Gold Coast and Beaudesert officially captured wind gusts of nearly 60km/h this morning.

He said the winds felled trees at Springbrook, while more than 1000 Gold Coast homes and businesses were temporarily without power, according to Energex.

“The peak of the winds were around the Gold Coast hinterland, in a really isolated area,” Mr Clark said.

“We don’t have weather stations in the Gold Coast hinterland, so we can’t verify how strong it was. But the gale force winds for Gold and Sunshine Coast waters are pretty dangerous.”

The bureau has a hazardous surf warning stretching from Fraser Island to the Hunter Coast in NSW.

“It’s whipped up 5m swells. There’s a lot of energy out on the water,” he said.

“It’s in a fairly southerly direction so not really hitting the beaches but it’s a massive area that it’s impacting.”

A rain band is forecast for the south western corner of the state on Wednesday and expected to move into the South East by later in the week.