Severe thunderstorm batters Cairns with more than 7000 lightning strikes

More than 7000 lightning strikes hit Cairns overnight with some suburbs receiving 100mm of rain in just one hour, and many homes still without power.

More than 3,000 customers in the Trinity Park and Holloways Beach areas are without power. Picture: Supplied.

More than 7000 lightning strikes hit Cairns in the early hours of Thursday morning with some suburbs receiving 100mm of rain in just one hour.

The storm began about 2am with rainfall varying across the region.

Bureau of Meteorology community information officer, Morgan Pumpa, said the weather was “extremely localised”.

“While severe thunderstorms aren’t expected, it’s important to monitor radar and warnings,” she said.

More than 3000 homes within the Trinity Park and Holloways Beach areas were without power early Thursday morning.

Council Regional Council crews were on clean up duty early Thursday morning, clearing debris and damage from last night’s storm. Picture: Supplied.

More than 7000 lightning strikes hit Cairns and surrounding suburbs overnight as a wild storm hit the city. Picture: Supplied.

According to Ergon Energy, these were unplanned outages, caused by damage requiring emergency repairs.

Power was lost just after 2am with 1831 customers in the Holloways Beach area initially impacted.

Surrounding suburbs also impacted included Aeroglen, Barron, Machans Beach, Redlynch and Stratford, with an additional 1339 customers in the Smithfield and Trinity Park area.

Council Regional Council crews were on clean up duty early Thursday morning, clearing debris and damage from last night’s storm. Picture: Supplied.

Ms Pumpa said Cairns Racecourse had recorded just 4mm of rain, while the Cairns Airport received 144.6mm over the past 24 hours — 103mm of that fell between 2am and 3am.

Innisfail recorded only 31mm, which Ms Pumpa said “highlighted the highly localised nature of the rainfall”.

“Despite the overnight storms, there’s still a chance for more thunderstorms today (Thursday), with instability remaining,” she said.

Council were up early on clean up duty around Cairns after an intense storm hit on Wednesday night into the early hours of Thursday. Picture: Supplied.

“Looking ahead, tomorrow might bring up to 25mm of rain, which could be the next significant weather event in the next seven days.”

Ms Pumpa said wind speeds during the storm were not as notable, with the highest gust recorded at 31 km/h just after 2am.

“The winds shifted from south-westerly to north-westerly but didn’t contribute significantly to the storm’s intensity,” she said.

During the storm 7435 lightning strikes were recorded within 56km of Cairns Airport, and 1961 strikes within just 8km.

“These strikes show the intensity of the storm in certain areas with thunderclaps also notably loud for those who experienced them,” Ms Pumpa said.

Clearing debris and damage from last night’s storm was councils priority on Thursday morning. Picture: Supplied.

Ergon Energy crews were working to restore service to affected areas, with Trinity Park and Holloways Beach showing no further energy disruptions as of 9am on Thursday.

It comes a day before the one year anniversary of Tropical Cyclone Jasper which crossed the Far North Queensland coast at Wujal Wujal as a category two system on December 13, 2023.

A staggering 2000mm fell in some parts of the region in the days that followed, making it the wettest cyclone in Australian history.

Originally published as Severe thunderstorm batters Cairns with more than 7000 lightning strikes