Records broken as heavy rain ‘sets up shop’ over south-east NSW
Petra Stock
Yesterday’s heavy rain saw several sites recording their highest daily September falls.
Angus Hines, senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said a broad band of persistent and heavy rain “set up shop” over the south-east from Wednesday afternoon into the evening, particularly affecting Sydney, Wollongong, the Illawarra and the south coast.
The highest rainfall in the state was 181mm at Greenwell Point, 93km south of Wollongong, in the 24 hours to 9am Thursday.
In Sydney, 122mm of rain was recorded, making it the city’s second highest September rainfall on record at Observatory Hill weather station. The last time the site recorded rainfall close to this figure was 110mm in 1883.
According to the BoM, several sites recorded their highest September daily rainfall:
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Collaroy (Long Reef Golf Club): 108mm.
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Sydney Botanic Gardens: 116mm.
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Rose Bay (Royal Sydney Golf Club): 110mm.
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Randwick (Randwick St): 145.8mm.
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Marrickville Golf Club: 81mm.
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Peakhurst Golf Club: 113mm.
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Cronulla South Bowling Club: 147mm.
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Campbelltown: 99mm.
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Camden Airport: 77.8mm.
Read more here:
Key events
Petra Stock
Sydney light rail passengers rescued after flash flooding
Andrew Edmunds, an SES spokesperson, said crews had responded to “a large volume of incidents” with more than 850 calls for assistance in a 50-minute period at about 8:30pm on Wednesday. Crews responded to about 600 incidents.
A number of vehicles were caught in flash flooding, including a light rail vehicle getting stuck on Anzac Parade in Sydney.
He said:
Crews brought 20 to 30 passengers to safety, and also used an Ark Angel raft to ferry an elderly passenger across some of the water.
SES crews also assisted about 10 passengers from a bus, one of a number of vehicles that “came into strife with the heavy rain”.
Records broken as heavy rain ‘sets up shop’ over south-east NSW
Petra Stock
Yesterday’s heavy rain saw several sites recording their highest daily September falls.
Angus Hines, senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said a broad band of persistent and heavy rain “set up shop” over the south-east from Wednesday afternoon into the evening, particularly affecting Sydney, Wollongong, the Illawarra and the south coast.
The highest rainfall in the state was 181mm at Greenwell Point, 93km south of Wollongong, in the 24 hours to 9am Thursday.
In Sydney, 122mm of rain was recorded, making it the city’s second highest September rainfall on record at Observatory Hill weather station. The last time the site recorded rainfall close to this figure was 110mm in 1883.
According to the BoM, several sites recorded their highest September daily rainfall:
-
Collaroy (Long Reef Golf Club): 108mm.
-
Sydney Botanic Gardens: 116mm.
-
Rose Bay (Royal Sydney Golf Club): 110mm.
-
Randwick (Randwick St): 145.8mm.
-
Marrickville Golf Club: 81mm.
-
Peakhurst Golf Club: 113mm.
-
Cronulla South Bowling Club: 147mm.
-
Campbelltown: 99mm.
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Camden Airport: 77.8mm.
Read more here:
Caitlin Cassidy
Education minister says ANU’s future vice-chancellor a ‘matter for council’
The education minister, Jason Clare, has issued a short statement after the vice-chancellor of the Australian National University, Prof Genevieve Bell, tendered her resignation.
Clare said Bell’s resignation and the appointment of her successor were “matters for the ANU council”. He continued:
I wish Professor Bell well for the future. Significant governance concerns at ANU have been raised with me. That’s why I’ve referred ANU’s governance to TEQSA [The Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency] for assessment.
TEQSA recently appointed former Public Service Commissioner Lynelle Briggs to inform that work.
The ANU will hold an all-staff town hall at 1.30pm today to discuss the changes. Following the meeting, the university’s chancellor, Julie Bishop, will hold a press conference alongside interim vice chancellor Prof Rebekah Brown.
Read more here:
Kevin Rudd says Charlie Kirk death is ‘deeply distressing’
Kevin Rudd has released a statement regarding the death of the US rightwing political activist and Donald Trump ally, Charlie Kirk.
A short time ago, the Australian ambassador to the US and former prime minister said via his X feed:
The death of Charlie Kirk today is deeply distressing. There is no space for political violence in any democracy.
My thoughts, and those of all Australians, are with his family and loved ones.
Read more here:
Benita Kolovos
Labor minister says machete amnesty ‘not about trying to find people who want to break the law’
Carbines added the government never anticipated all machetes would be handed in at the bins:
Be under no illusion, it’s not about trying to find people who want to break the law, popping things in the bins. This is about law abiding citizens reducing the supply and the accessibility and the availability of edged weapons in the community … Those people who want to hang on to edged weapons and machetes face two years in prison, or $47,000 fines.
He says so far almost 500 machetes have been surrendered as well as other weapons, including nunchucks, with the bins swapped out as often as every 24 hours.
Carbines also denied claims made by Liberal MP Nick McGowan that the disposal can be easily opened with a $9 tool from Bunnings. He said police and experts say the “bins are secure” and the only people trying to tamper with them were the Liberal party:
This goes to the sheer weirdness of Liberal party, that they are actively seeking to encourage people to break into the bins, and that they are actively seeking to undermine the amnesty.
Benita Kolovos
Victoria police minister defends machete amnesty
Victoria’s police minister, Anthony Carbines, has defended the government’s machete amnesty, saying it was never designed to “find people who want to break the law”.
On 1 September, Victoria enacted a ban on machetes as a prohibited weapon making it illegal to own, carry, use, buy or sell them without an exemption. The ban includes a three-month amnesty period from September to November 2025, during which people can safely surrender their machetes at bins at police stations.
Speaking to reporters outside parliament this morning, Carbines said the amnesty was designed to give people an opportunity to safely dispose of weapons before it became a crime to own one.
If you criminalise overnight, anyone who’s got one in their back shed is breaking the law. You need to give people an opportunity to comply with the law, to have an amnesty by which there’s a safe way to dispose of these weapons. Otherwise, people just throw them into any bin in the street and then they fall into the wrong hands.
Petra Stock
Tornadoes in NSW a rare occurrence, BoM says
While New South Wales experienced a selection of “severe weather flavours” yesterday, the most notable of these was the formation of at least two tornadoes, the Bureau of Meteorology’s Angus Hines said.
At least two touched down yesterday afternoon – one near Young in the north-west, and one near Caragabal, about 400km west of Sydney.
Tornadoes are fairly unusual occurrences, Hines said. They form from supercell thunderstorms, where a column of rising air spirals northwards and can create a vortex which – when the conditions are just right – can spiral down and eventually touch the ground.
On average, Australia experiences about 60 to 80 tornadoes a year. Hines said:
A lot of those go pretty much unnoticed because they occur over very sparsely populated places. And a good chunk of them happen in the far south-west exposed coasts of Western Australia.
Getting them over in New South Wales is certainly pretty rare. I imagine a lot of people would live their whole lives out there and never see one.
Benita Kolovos
Victoria Liberal MP says Nampijinpa Price should apologise to Indian community
Victorian Liberal MP Evan Mulholland also had a bit to say about Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s dumping from the federal party’s shadow cabinet.
Mulholland, who represents Victoria’s northern metropolitan region in the upper house, has been a vocal supporter of the Indian community and was among the first to condemn the racist rhetoric linked to the March for Australia rallies.
He said he “absolutely” supported Sussan Ley’s move to sack the senator after she refused to express support for the Liberal leader or apologise for her comments about Indian migrants.
Mulholland told reporters outside parliament:
The comments were deeply hurtful. I’ve been speaking to Indian community leaders over the past week, and the Indian community makes a great contribution to Australia. They’re entrepreneurial, aspirational, very decent and very, very hard working and it’s important that we show, as Brad Battin and I have shown over the last few weeks, the targeting of our Indian community will not be accepted by anyone and should not be accepted by anyone in this state.
He added that Price should have apologised:
Say sorry, because the Indian community were deeply hurt by those comments. Sorry was an appropriate word to use, and she should have used it.
Vice-chancellor of the Australia National University resigns
Caitlin Cassidy
The vice-chancellor of the Australian National University (ANU) has tendered her resignation after a tumultuous two years at the institution marked by redundancies, proposed course closures and allegations of a toxic work culture.
Multiple sources told Guardian Australia that Prof Genevieve Bell had advised the council of her decision on Wednesday evening, with Provost Rebekah Brown to be interim vice-chancellor until a replacement is found.
Pressure was mounting for Bell to exit after five of the six college deans advised the council and chancellor, Julie Bishop, that they no longer had confidence in her leadership, sources confirmed.
Last week, Bishop held a full day of meetings on campus with deans, council members and members of the union.
She returned to campus on Wednesday to meet with members of the ANU governance project, a group of academics and staff who formed this year amid a growing “crisis of confidence” in leadership at the university, and again met with members of the union on Thursday morning.
We are expecting a formal announcement from ANU at 11am.
US influencer who Bob Irwin labelled a ‘dickhead’ leaves Australia
Joe Hinchliffe
Mike Holston, the US influencer who calls himself “The Real Tarzann” but who Bob Irwin sensationally labelled a “dickhead”, has left the country, Guardian Australia understands.
Holston posted two online videos of himself grappling with a freshwater and a juvenile saltwater crocodile in films he indicated were shot in north Queensland.
The state’s environment authorities described the actions as “extremely dangerous and illegal”, while animal rights and environmental advocates described them as “absolutely abhorrent” and “incredibly cruel”.
None were more colourful in their condemnation, though, than the father of the late and legendary “Crocodile Hunter” Steve Irwin.
Irwin Sr issued a statement about Holston saying “this bloke clearly had no clue” how to handle a crocodile without putting it under dangerous stress, and was among those who said urgent reform was needed so that “nature laws to apply to social media”.
“The more dramatic, or cruel the interaction, the more money these accounts make,” Bob Irwin said, adding:
It’s like a runaway train and it sets a dangerous precedent for others to copy.
Benita Kolovos
The Victorian opposition leader, Brad Battin, has declined requests to do media this morning but has issued a statement on Smith’s resignation. It reads:
Stuart Smith’s resignation was the right thing to do. His comments were unacceptable and do not reflect the standards of professionalism, integrity and inclusion that we all expect of each other. I lead a team that aspires to the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and inclusion. My focus, and the focus of every one of my MPs, is to deliver real solutions for every Victorian – safer communities, better services and cost of living relief.
Benita Kolovos
Labor minister on division in Victorian Liberal party
More on the resignation of the director of the Victorian Liberal party, Stuart Smith.
The Victorian minister Danny Pearson said the messages published by the Australian proved the Liberal party was “deeply divided”. He told reporters outside parliament:
If you cannot govern yourselves, how on earth are you going to be able to govern the state? If this is how they treat each other, how are they going to treat ordinary Victorians?
Ley maintains Nampijinpa Price a ‘valued member’ of the team
Despite Ley dumping Jacinta Nampijinpa Price from the shadow ministry yesterday, the opposition leader said the senator remained a “valued member” of the team.
Ley said earlier:
Jacinta is a valued member of our Liberal party team in our Liberal party party room and has contributed much in public policy and debate in this country and will continue to do so.
Benita Kolovos
Victoria Liberals respond to Smith resignation
At parliament this morning, Victorian Liberals have backed the state director Stuart Smith’s resignation, describing his comments as “inappropriate” and “unacceptable”.
Smith resigned after leaked messages were published by the Australian revealing he ridiculed the party’s women’s council and upper house MP Bev McArthur.
The party’s police spokesperson, David Southwick, told reporters the comments were “inappropriate”, the party had “acted”:
Nobody should be making inappropriate comments. The matter has been handled, and we’re moving on. What Victorians expect from their politicians is to be standing up for them and focused on them and that’s what I’ll be doing every day.
Pressed on whether the Brad Battin had intervened to force Smith’s resignation, Southwick stressed the parliamentary party and its headquarters were separate:
We, as members of parliament, leave it to our Liberal party headquarters. We don’t get involved in how the party operates, and that’s for them.
Evan Mullholland, the Liberals deputy leader in the upper house, made similar comments:
I thought they [the comments] were completely unacceptable, and it’s a good thing that he’s resigned, and the party has moved on. We’re focused on leading up into the next election, winning the next election, because Victoria needs change.
Ley apologises to Indian Australians, but won’t go into discussions she had with Nampijinpa Price
Ley said she spoke with Jacinta Nampijinpa Price yesterday, but wouldn’t go into what she called “private discussions” with the senator.
Ley told reporters her decision to dump Nampijinpa Price from the shadow ministry yesterday “speaks for itself”.
Ley also sent out an apology to Indian Australians who were hurt by Nampijinpa Price’s remarks:
May I take this opportunity, as leader of the Liberal party, to apologise to all Indian Australians and indeed others who were hurt and distressed by the comments that were made, comments that I said at the time should not have been made.
May I reaffirm my strong support for all our migrant communities for the values that they bring to this country, for the contribution they make and for choosing to come to Australia.
Sussan Ley says Coalition ‘stands in solidarity’ with those mourning Charlie Kirk
Sussan Ley is speaking from Hobart, where she just remarked on the shooting of right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk in the US. Ley said:
Can I also send solidarity to the US because of what appears to be a political assassination of Charlie Kirk. We stand in solidarity with those who mourn.
