Rain, 90km/h winds lashes NSW, as deluge brings a month of rain in a day

A cold front has settled off the NSW coast forming a low pressure system that is predicted to have dumped a month’s worth of rain in just one day on some areas.

Brave souls queue for their Covid-19 jab at Sydney Olympic Park. Picture: Bianca De Marchi

A cold front that lashed the nation’s southeast and sent temperatures plummeting on Tuesday has settled off the NSW coast, forming a low-pressure system that is predicted to have dumped a month’s worth of rain in just one day in some areas.

NSW’s central and south coast residents woke to torrential rain on Tuesday morning, after falls of up to 40mm were recorded across Greater Sydney overnight, with between 20mm and 40mm falling on Tuesday and 35mm forecast for overnight into Wednesday.

Mangrove Mountain on the Central Coast recorded 36mm in just seven hours from 9am on Tuesday, with Sydney Airport recording 33mm and Canterbury in Sydney’s west recording 31.6mm.

Big surf at a bleak Bondi Beach. Picture: John Grainger

Sydney’s average rainfall for August is about 80mm.

Bureau of Meteorology senior forecaster Miriam Bradbury said the low-pressure system had moved east across the country, ending Sydney’s 15-day streak of warm winter days above 20C, the longest stretch since records began, and it wasn’t expected to clear until Wednesday.

“It started like all cold fronts, moving up across the Southern Ocean from further south, dragging colder air with it,” she said.

“It clipped south WA last week and moved across the Bight and then pushed up across southern parts of Victoria and brought that colder air from the Southern Ocean as well as hail.”

A determined runner gets her one hour of lockdown exercise. Picture: John Grainger

Authorities have urged residents in coastal areas to take care as wild winds of 60 to 70 km/h lash NSW, with peak gusts possibly reaching 90 km/h along the coastal fringe near Sydney and the Illawarra, with waves up to 6m.

More than 350 requests for ­assistance were made across NSW from Monday night to late on Tuesday, with about 140 of those from the Sydney area.