'Ground zero at 4am': Shop owner's flood nightmare

SHOPS in the Byron Bay CBD have been flooded after heavy rain overnight and this morning.

A BYRON Bay shop owner has described how his shop flooding in the early hours of the morning, after the town copped 250mm of rain.

Byron Corner Store owner, Reif Hand, said "it was a lot of rain".

"It was ground zero here about 4am," he said.

"Water came through the side of the shop... but otherwise it's subsided now and better than what it was.

"Customers are still coming in and getting coffee, so come on down.

"It's just a game of luck, if it keeps raining that heavy.

"It's been mooted for a while by the council to make the pipe bigger and better, but they haven't got around to it."

Byron Shire Council's acting manager of infrastructure services, Phil Warner, told the ABC much of the inundation around Byron Bay's town centre was the result of drainage difficulties.

He said the council had yesterday worked to lower a sand boom at Belongil Creek, but current ocean and tidal conditions may be hampering stormwater drainage for the region.

"Our crews are out there now clearing away that debris," he said.

"I just want to reassure the community there is a drainage maintenance program and we continue with that."