As the district pins its hopes on every rain cloud for some drought relief, some older citizens may recall a weather event called ‘The Little Audrey’ which blew through Glen Innes in 1964.
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This year marks Audrey’s golden anniversary, as brought to the Examiner’s attention by reader David Newport who considers it one of the most remarkable weather events in the history of the district, when Glen Innes was hit by a tropical cyclone.
“Tropical cyclone Audrey formed to the north of the Gulf of Carpentaria, not far from where Tracey formed 10 years after, on January 8, 1964,” Mr Newport said.
“It moved east, to the north of Thursday Island, before looping back west to the south of the island, travelling south off the Cape York coast and then headed inland, tracking south-south-easterly.”
Mr Newport said the cyclone left vast areas of flooding in its wake, along with felled trees and damaged buildings. St George, Goondiwindi and Ashford suffered damage, with the ‘eye’ of the cyclone arriving in Glen Innes at around noon on January 14 before moving back out to sea the next morning near Coffs.
“Eighty to 90 mile an hour winds hit the town, along with a drenching of torrential driving rain,”
- Local citizen David Newport
“Eighty to 90 mile an hour winds hit the town, along with a drenching of torrential driving rain,” he said.
Trees were thrown down and houses were damaged, with extensive flooding around the parklands. Mr Newport said a candy shop in Deepwater collapsed, with local children enjoying an unplanned lolly scramble. Acres of trees were brought down when the cyclone passed over Mt Mitchell.
“But the greatest heartbreak of all was the parks,” Mr Newport said.
“Huge trees that were decades old were pulled out by the roots and pushed over, with papers both locally and nationally describing them as ‘never to be replaced in a lifetime’.”
Mr Newport said an older resident “who was a bit of a weather buff” told him ‘the wind and rain hit suddenly, like in a bad thunderstorm, first from the north-east and, after half an hour, it reached a crescendo then simply just stopped.
‘The rain eased off to a drizzle with hardly any wind, and the sun was shining briefly. My barometer was down to 28.9 inches, and 10 or 15 minutes later, it hit again but from the south west.
‘I don’t think the wind was quite as bad the second time, and slowly eased off leaving only heavy rain.’
Mr Newport said that although the cyclone was officially named Cyclone Audrey, many locals referred to it as ‘the Little Audrey’.
“I think Little Audrey was some kind of fictitious character of the day that people used to make jokes about,” he said.
Bureau of Meteorology records show that close to 50mm of rain fell on the district two days before the cyclone hit, followed up by around 36mm found in the gauge the morning following the hit.
