By TANIA PHILLIPS
FIVE SES crews from across the Southern Downs were kept busy on Sunday afternoon as the area said goodbye to spring with a damaging afternoon storm.
Jamie Goodwin, who was acting SES Controller on Sunday when the storm hit, said crews from Stanthorpe and Wallangarra joined the three Warwick crews to respond to calls.
“We have 40 members on the ground,” he said of the storm which was the SES’s first major incident of the year.
The crews responded to 35 calls on Sunday and a further 17 on Monday.
He said while there was one house reporting damage to the roof, the majority of calls were for fallen trees and windows broken by the hail.
Meanwhile, as the clean-up continued through Monday and Tuesday, Southern Downs Regional Council’s Director Engineering Services Peter See said the council’s parks and gardens staff were kept busy undertaking clean-up works in the parks around the Warwick town area, with Victoria Park receiving most of the damage to trees.
He said the shade sails over the fitness equipment on the approach to O.O. Madsen Bridge were damaged and council staff erected barrier mesh to close the area until repairs could be undertaken.
Council Works Maintenance and Construction crews assisted parks and gardens staff with collecting debris on footpaths and public land around Warwick.
The council’s street sweepers also undertook the clean-up of leaf litter on the streets as a result of the storm.
Residents were advised, however, that Southern Downs Regional Council would not collect green waste, such as trees and vegetation, or materials that come from private properties following the weekend’s storms and would only clean up street trees affected by the storms.
Residents were advised to take their green waste and other materials to the council’s waste transfer and waste management facilities.
Across southern Queensland crews were kept busy on the Sunday afternoon with about 200 requests for assistance following the thunderstorms.
More than 100 of these were from the Ipswich area.
The majority of call-outs were for smashed windows, fallen trees and powerlines and leaking roofs.
SES volunteers respond to hundreds of requests during peak storm activity.
They are now asking those who need assistance to be patient because most SES tasks are not quick jobs and often extensive work and time is required to attend to storm damage.
For storm and flood emergency assistance, contact the State Emergency Service (SES) on 132 500 and in a life-threatening emergency dial triple zero (000).
More pictures on page 5.
