Weather bureau has reissued warning for similar conditions tomorrow

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The clean up is underway in the New South Wales Illawarra region after winds of up to 100km an hour were recorded in some areas. The weather bureau has reissued a warning of similar conditions for tomorrow.

Transcript

00:00Today looks vastly different than it did yesterday.

00:05The same blue skies but without the relentless winds that we saw.

00:09Winds of up to 60 to 80 k's an hour, those averages, and wind gusts of up to 110 k's

00:15an hour.

00:16Further south of where I am in Port Kembler, we saw recorded winds of up to 113 k's an

00:22hour and Albion Park, 107 k's an hour.

00:26Now these kinds of conditions really chopped up the waters behind me making it really dangerous

00:31for swimmers.

00:32They also brought down trees and branches onto power lines, cars and homes causing widespread

00:38damage as well as power outages.

00:41The SES says it received 630 calls for help and have been tending to those incidences

00:47right through until the morning.

00:49We saw some disruption to the Wollongong CBD as well, 16 people had to be evacuated from

00:55a multi-storey business after the windows of that building were seen to be moving in

01:01the wind and authorities closed down the road, moved those people out to ensure that there

01:07was no ongoing hazard.

01:09We also saw signage of an interiors business in Crown Street that flew off and the road

01:15was closed for a couple of hours as well so that crews could remove the rest of that signage

01:20and rid of that hazard.

01:21The SES says it is incredibly fortunate that there were no reported injuries.

01:27The initial weather warning was meant to reprieve in the early afternoon yesterday but by lunchtime

01:33that was reissued into the early evening and that is exactly what we saw.

01:37Now yesterday afternoon was particularly busy for fire crews as they tended to a grass fire

01:43that was fanned up by those winds and that was on the side of the M1 Princes motorway

01:48at Kanahooka and northbound traffic was closed for several hours and caused quite a few headaches

01:54for commuters there.

01:56We have also seen 2,500 people this morning still without power and Endeavour Energy says

02:03they have to tend to 200 hazards before they can turn the lights on for those homes.

02:08Fire authorities are still on alert for today as with these winds it is still unseasonably

02:14hot as well.

02:16The Weather Bureau has reissued a similar wind warning for tomorrow.

02:21We're expecting 60 to 70 k's an hour averages and wind gusts of up to 100 k's an hour.

02:28So it will be similar to what we saw yesterday and people are being urged to take care and

02:33watch out going into the weekend.

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