A severe thunderstorm hit south-east Queensland, Australia, Sunday evening with 80,000 lightning strikes, damaging winds and hailstones the size of golf balls, cutting power to more than 20,000 homes. In Warwick, west of the Gold coast, peak wind gusts touched 78mph, ripping off the roofs of more than a dozen homes, and in Harrisville 72mm (2.8in) of rain fell in just 30 minutes, flooding roads and inundating homes.
Two backpackers caught in the storm in Stanthorpe were unlucky enough to be struck by lightning as they took a selfie photo, but survived to tell the tale.
Across the northern plains in the US 20-25cm of snow fell on Monday bringing snow-packed roads and limited visibility. There were 70 accidents in Sioux Falls and nearly 250 crashes in Minnesota.
The snow record was broken at Sioux Falls regional airport, with 22cm measured on Monday night, beating the record of 19.3cm in 1954. There has been nearly 44cm of snowfall in November, which is just over half of what fell throughout the 2014-2015 season.
Meanwhile, last Thursday, in the east Pacific Ocean Hurricane Sandra dumped over 600mm of rain along Mexico’s west coast, and winds reached 150mph. Although Sandra weakened dramatically and did not make landfall, it was unusually strong for the time of year, occurring late in the tropical storm season, which runs from the middle of May to the end of November.
Only three previous observed tropical storms have formed later in the calendar and Sandra became the strongest hurricane recorded so late in the season. The 2015 hurricane season has been recognised as the second most active on record in the eastern Pacific, with a total of 26 named storms.
