CRASHING DOWN: The Great Western Hotel awning could not withstand the heavy deluge from Saturday's storm. Photo: JOHN KICH
THIS awning at the Great Western Hotel did not survive Saturday night’s wild weather but the worst is over for Orange residents, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.
Forecaster Mohammed Nabi said the north of the state and Queensland should buckle down for damaging winds and flash flooding but the Orange area probably wouldn’t experience more than 10 millimetres of rain over the next couple of days as ex-tropical cyclone Oswald heads back out to sea.
“You might get the tail end but I can’t see gale-force winds coming down your parts of the world,” he said.
Predicting the weather can be more of an art rather than science and Orange State Emergency Services controller Kim Stevens is not taking any chances.
He said crews were on standby and fully operational.
“I’m no meteorologist but looking at the scanner we’re looking at anywhere between 10 and 75 millimetres but that is in the lap of the gods at the moment,” he said.
“It’s certainly shrinking as it heads south.”
Before Saturday’s storm Orange’s January weather was set to be one of the driest months on record, however in two days the bureau recorded 55.4 millimetres up until Monday morning at 9am.
Previously Orange had 2.2 millimetres for the month of January.
In January last year Orange had 95.8 millimetres of rain.