AUSTRALIAN CYCLONE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17326, 25 November 1919, Page 9

AUSTRALIAN CYCLONE.

*. I DEVASTATION AT CASINO. MANY HOUSES DAMAGED. THREE PERSONS INJURED. [from our OWN correspondent.] SYDNEY. Nov. 38. The terrible drought which is hanging over a great portion of this continent breeds cyclonic conditions. Places inland are always in danger of a blow. Even here in Sydney scarcely a day passes when a thunderstorm does not come rumbling and growling across the sky. There is a | thunderstorm proceeding vigorously at this | moment. But these storms amount to little, and pass away in an hour. The possibilities of cyclonic conditions are illustrated by what happened to Casino, a, town in northern New South Wales, last Saturday. Without warning, except that there had been three days of heavy, muggy weather, a terrific gale sprang up, attended by heavy hail and rain. Events after that cannot be fol- j lowed in proper sequence. Here, however, I is the net result, and the least imaginative ! can fill in the blanks : — ■ i Practically not one of th-> 900 houses in the town escaped damage. Scores were completely unroofed. Hailstones as large as hen eggs went through iron and slate roofs. Every window in the town facing the south and ■west was smashed. Every glass lamp in the streets was destroyed : 116 panes of glass were broken ; in the public hospital. The hail blocked up the gutters, and ' floods of water poured into business pre-j mises. A grocer's horse, maddened by the hail, bolted, fell into a street putter, j and was drowned. j A man, a girl, and a boy were shelter- ! ine behind a plate-glass window. '['he' window blew in, and they were injured. ; the man badly. One man's house fell in on him, but lie escaped with a broken i thieh. j Every garden in the town was ruined, , and fruit trees completely stripped. Birds and poultry were killed in all direction*. A pair of horses attached to a cab bolted for two miles. A large sawmill was flattened to the ground, including the smokestack. This cyclonic storm, from beginning to end. lasted not moT e than 15 minutes. : : ——!