40 Years Ago Today Cyclone Alby Paid A Visit

Where Were You?


Article heading image for 40 Years Ago Today Cyclone Alby Paid A Visit

Time flies doesn't it?

Do you remember the day one of the most destructive cyclones crossed Western Australia, causing millions of dollars worth of damage and taking 5 lives?

Here's some history recorded by the Weather Bureau:

One man was blown from the roof of a shed and a woman was killed by a falling pine tree. Another man was killed when a tree fell on the bulldozer he was operating and two men drowned at Albany when their dinghy overturned. Storm surge and large waves caused coastal inundation and erosion from Perth to Busselton. Fires fanned by the very strong winds burned an estimated 114 000 ha of forest and farming land.

Large waves and a storm surge generated by the northerly winds caused substantial coastal erosion along the Lower West coast particularly in the Geographe Bay area. Low-lying areas at Bunbury and Busselton were flooded, forcing the evacuation of many homes including the Bunbury Nursing Home. Photo 2 shows floodwaters through the streets of Bunbury. An approximate 1.1 m storm surge at Busselton caused the tide to peak at 2.5 m about 1 m above the highest astronomical tide. The Busselton Jetty was severely damaged. At Fremantle the surge was about 0.6 m causing a high tide of 1.8 m, about 0.5 m above the highest astronomical tide. While this was not sufficient to cause flooding in Perth it did combine with large waves to scour beaches, as shown in photo 1. A large number of small boating craft were damaged.

By contrast there was little rainfall during the event. Perth did not record any rainfall and the heaviest rainfall in the southwest was less than 40 mm.

Hopefuly we'll never see it's like again.

4 April 2018

Article by:

Cliff Reeve




Listen Live!
Up Next