Storm wreaks havoc on the Bellarine

A SEVERE storm cell that swept through Curlewis, Drysdale and Clifton Springs on Friday last week resulted in thousands of dollars’ worth of damage to nine homes.
The destruction included an uprooted trampoline that caused extensive damage to a neighbouring property, and left Bellarine SES unit controller John Ryan urging the community to anchor backyard equipment.
“We had a very severe storm cell over and
around Curlewis on Friday night and early Saturday morning, that resulted in nine call-outs in total,” he said.
“We had multiple incidents, one in Ocean Grove and the rest in the Curlewis area. It was a busy night; a trampoline got uprooted and caused massive damage.”
He said flying trampolines were common during severe storm cells, along with garden umbrellas and even children’s cubby houses.
“I’ve been in the SES for eight years and you would be amazed what you see on a person’s roof. It’s so important to secure a trampoline correctly as they fly a long way and cause massive damage – like in this instance.
“My idea of anchoring is to have concrete put into the ground. People are a bit naïve to the fact it’s a piece of equipment in their backyard; secure it.”

The Carter family in Curlewis were asleep when they heard a “deafening sound” followed by water cascading into the property.
“We were all fast asleep in bed when around 11.15pm we just heard the most horrendous noise and everybody leapt out of bed, we were pretty frightened,” Sarah Carter said.
“We went out the front on the balcony and looked down at the front garden and there were smashed roof tiles everywhere. The weather was bad that night with winds and heavy rain.
“We went downstairs and as we moved around the house, we realised three sections of our roof had
blown off.”
Ms Carter said her husband Matthew phoned the SES as water ran “as if a tap was turned on” into their theatre room, toilet and walk-in wardrobe.
“We were grabbing buckets and towels; water was flowing in through the skylight. The floors were sodden. When the SES arrived, they couldn’t do anything that night because it’s a double storey house.
“The next morning a few neighbours congregated out the front; their houses had been damaged, too. One of our neighbours lost the roof from the whole back of his house.”
And while we can’t control the weather Mr Ryan said we can take some commonsense preventative measures, to help lessen the impact of severe storm cells.
“Anchor your backyard equipment, clean out your gutters and downpipes and if your house begins to flood, turn off the electricity.”