Severe thunderstorms forecast in the south-east heatwave persists

Thousands of homes are without power and flights have been diverted after a severe thunderstorm hit the southern Gold Coast this morning.

Transcript

00:00The weather is starting to ease, however, there were chaotic scenes across the Gold

00:06Coast, especially here on the southern end at Tweed Heads, where we saw a severe weather

00:11event, a severe thunderstorm batter the region at around 9 o'clock this morning.

00:16Wind gusts of up to 90 kilometres per hour were recorded, and as a result of that, power

00:22lines went down, trees went down, and as a result we saw homes cut, 2,000s of homes.

00:28Now that wind was so strong that it toppled this massive tree here at this daycare centre

00:33on Kennedy Drive here at Tweed Heads at around 10 o'clock NSW time, and as you can see, there

00:39is a car, emergency services are trying to remove the tree, which has unfortunately toppled

00:46on top of a car, and we understand it belonged to a parent who was dropping his child off

00:51here to the centre.

00:53Now staff say that the children remain inside, and we understand that that driver who was

01:00inside that car was able to be freed and remains in a stable condition.

01:05At the Gold Coast Airport, as you mentioned at the top of the hour, we saw flights delayed

01:11as a result of a brief power outage there, and we understand that one flight had to be

01:16diverted to Brisbane.

01:18Unfortunately more storms are forecast for later today, but fortunately it is not expected

01:23to be as severe as the one we saw earlier this morning.

01:26We've just got home, and oh my God, there's trees on top of the preschool.

01:31Apparently the man in the blue car had just dropped his little boy off, thank goodness,

01:36otherwise he wouldn't be here.

01:38Devastation.

01:39Absolutely.

01:40Now emergency services are warning people in the area to drive safely and to not park

01:44their cars near trees and to expect delays, particularly around this area here on the

01:50Gold Coast.