It wasn’t raining cats and dogs but for a town long suffering from the drought the rainfall that keeps falling in the far west town of Tibooburra is more than welcome.
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One road is closed out of town because of the rain, a very unusual event, and even just the sound of precipitation on the roof was enough to buoy spirits for a little while.
Up until 12am the town had received a bit more than 10mm, with showers continuing, in a district that’s recorded just half its annual average rainfall so far this year (52mm).
Melissa of the Family Hotel was ecstatic at least the town had cloudy skies for a change. The last decent rain was on March 23. “We didn’t know what it was, we were wondering what was happening out there,” she joked as the rain came down about 9pm last night (Monday night).
“It was certainly great to hear it on the roof .”
The rain event is heading east. One area in the far west (Grasmere) recorded 56mm near White Cliffs.
The Bureau of Meteorology has predicted 30mm for Bourke tomorrow and similar falls at Cobar as a trough moves across the state. The trough is expected to sit over the middle of the state from Wednesday evening bringing some decent rainfall totals, with showers, and some storms embedded in the change. The good news is that another rain event is predicted by most weather forecasters for early next week in the central and northern parts of the state. Elders Weather is predicting Dubbo may get another 20-40mm early next week on top of this week’s rain ( up to 30mm possible).
The rain has given Tibooburra locals a short break from having to pull livestock out of muddy dams and feeding stock. Kangaroos have been dieing in their thousands from starvation.
John Illies, who has worked in National Parks most of his life, says he’s seen drier times, but the rain came at an important time.
“I’ve been here in duststorms and rabbit plagues. This one’s been pretty bad but everyone’s still been able to get by.”
Tibooburra has been slowly been losing its employees. The RTA cut back many years ago shedding 25 staff, and now NSW National Parks has cut back staff in Sturt National Park, making four workers redundant and park rangers cut back from four to just one part-time. The tiny town gets by without a council and is basically run by “volunteers”.
It was nice for the locals though to have to drive through puddles for a change to get to the hotel in town.
John Ellicott
journalist and author
journalist and author
