HARASSED SETTLERS

Evening Star, Issue 21316, 21 January 1933, Page 12

HARASSED SETTLERS

FLOODS AND FIRES IN AUSTRALIA iIAUV DISTRICTS AFFECTED Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright, SYDNEY, January 21. (Received January 21, at 1 p.m.) Described as the worst for twenty years, a storm lashed the Riverina and parts of Victoria. The flood waters entered the shops at Rupanyup (Victoria). Many fishing boats foundered in a forty-mile-an-hour gale at Queenscliff. Rain and bush fires were experienced in an uncanny jumble. While weary men fought grass fires around Balranald,. Rochester lay under a mantle of an inch of hailstones. About 4,000 acres of grass and crop and miles of fencing were destroyed in the Rheola district. .

One of the severest and most devastating hailstorms of recent years swept the Invorell district, in North-west New South Wales,- killing calves, sheep, rabbits, and birds. It caused heavy damage to the maize and fruit crops.; Jagged hail the size of golf balls left’ cattle bruised and bleeding.

A violent thunderstorm in Gympia (Queensland)- unroofed houses and sheds and uprooted trees. Flocks of sheep, trapped by the storm waters, were drowned, and seven head of cattle were killed by lightning. All the low lands are now under water, and the Condamine River is running a banker. Several bridges are, submerged.

Torrential rain was also experienced in many other centres. At Gatton hotels, business premises, and residences were flooded. A washaway occurred on the main line near Toowoomba, arid traffic was held up. It is forty years since the flood waters reached, the level that they did at Laidley, where the water swilled through the shops and homes, while cattle and miles of fencing were swept away. The water .is sft deep in the streets.

The town of Roma suffered severely* Houses were unroofed. and hundreds of sheep drowned, while the railway line was submerged in several places*