Strong winds left a trail of damage to trees and buildings along and near Byng Street during a violent storm on Friday night.
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Orange City SES unit commander Kim Stevens said 14 volunteers were called out to eight jobs on Friday night, and a further two on Saturday morning, in response to the wild conditions.
Weather readings taken at Orange Regional Airport recorded wind gusts of up to 65km/h.
“This one just came straight through the middle of town, straight down Byng Street,” Mr Stevens said.
This one just came straight through the middle of town, straight down Byng Street.
- Orange City SES unit commander Kim Stevens
“The storm when it came through it was pretty hard and fast. A lot of damage was a result of the wind rather than damage due to rainfall.”
Among the jobs the SES was called to was damage to the facade on the roof of Kmart, which could be closed until Wednesday as a result of the storm’s impact.
“About 30-metres of iron work came off in the wind,” Mr Stevens said.
“We managed to secure that, let the electricity people in, and got all the power sorted out.”
He said a tree branch went through a window at the CWA Hall in Robertson Park, among a host of other fallen limbs at the park.
“I noticed another tree that we weren’t called to at Robertson Park on Saturday morning,” Mr Stevens said.
SES volunteers also helped at the Uniting Wontama aged care facility after water got into a building.
“We had people up there to help the people with dementia to get around without being at risk,” Mr Stevens said.
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- READ MORE: Kmart store closed, staff assessing storm damage
The impact wasn’t limited to the city, with a “very large tree” across Old Canobolas Road requiring removal on Saturday morning.
“That was on a blind corner up there. We had Cabonne Council get the grader, we had that one sorted out [Saturday] morning,” Mr Stevens explained.
Friday night’s storm was the third time Orange SES volunteers have been called out since October 1 – the start of the storm season.
One of the previous call-outs was at Mayfield Vineyard at the beginning of October, where wild weather had “created a damage strip 200 metres wide and one to two kilometres long”.
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