By Angus Dalton
A dust storm blasting in from drought-stricken South Australia hit coastal NSW on Tuesday morning, blanketing towns in a yellow-tinged haze, cutting visibility in some areas to 300 metres and sparking an air quality alert for Sydney.
Air quality plunged to “extremely poor” levels in parts of Sydney, the Illawarra and the Hunter, where residents of some areas hit by the band of dust were urged to stay inside until the dust cleared.
One of the most powerful cold fronts this year whipped up dust clouds in South Australia and western Victoria over the past few days, Jiwon Park from the Bureau of Meteorology said.
Destructive winds reaching 70km/h on Monday left about 3500 properties north of Bendigo without power as the high winds struck Victoria.
Those fierce westerlies created a massive band of dust which spanned 600 kilometres across parts of South Australia, Victoria and south-west NSW by Monday afternoon.
“Instead of the dust being settled, it kept moving, impacting Canberra and the Southern and Central Tablelands,” Park said.
“It’s surprising because over our side it’s been quite wet, but this dust has managed to reach eastern NSW including Sydney.”
Before the dust reached NSW, thick orange haze smothered the towns of Orroroo in South Australia and Mildura in north-west Victoria. The bureau noted it was unusual for a dust storm to occur at this time of year, as such storms usually kick up in summer.
The clouds of haze had thinned by the time they reached the coast, sparing Sydney a repeat of the “red dawn” dust storm of September 2009 that delayed flights and caused an estimated $300 million clean-up bill.
Visibility nonetheless plunged to 300 metres at Camden Airport early on Tuesday morning, Park said.
The dust storm in Mildura on Monday afternoon.Credit: Lisa Cooper
Residents across Sydney, Wollongong and the South Coast were urged to stay indoors, close doors and windows and avoid physical activity outside until air quality improved in the afternoon.
Park said westerlies helped flush the dust out to sea. The bureau has warned damaging winds with 90km/h gusts would hit much of state’s east on Tuesday afternoon and into the evening.
The haze was a symptom of a severe drought stretching across Australia’s south, PhD candidate and dust storm researcher Tegan Clark from the Australian National University said. More dust storms may be on the horizon.
“If drought conditions continue, we can expect to see more local dust emissions out of South Australia,” Clark said.
Imagery from the Himawari-9 shows the dust storm as a bright pink cloud.Credit: Tegan Clark
The Yorke Peninsula in South Australia, the Victorian coastline from Warrnambool to Cape Otway and north-west Tasmania have received record-low rainfall this year. The parched conditions left dry, loose swaths of earth ready to be kicked up into airborne dust.
Adelaide has received only about 36 millimetres of rain this year – about 21 per cent of its running yearly average, according to Weatherzone.
The city’s desalination plant has increased its water supply in response, and other towns are under water restrictions or reliant on trucked-in water to refill rain tanks.
Areas across South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania starved of rain for the past year and a half.Credit: Bureau of Meteorology
The South Australian government has passed $78 million in drought support as struggling farmers enter their third year on fields and pastures starved of rain.
Long droughts are likely to hit southern Australia more often as climate change intensifies, recent research suggests.
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