© 2021 Greek Community Tribune All Rights Reserved

Wild weather causes widespread damage in South Australia

August 2025 Wild weather across South Australia has damaged coastal infrastructure but farmers will need far more rain in coming months if the state’s current grain crop is to secure a “miraculous recovery”, a leading grower says. A cold front pushed across South Australia on Wednesday, causing a storm surge and bringing strong winds and rain over agricultural areas. The front was part of a more protracted burst of wild weather that has kept emergency services busy earlier in July. The weather has damaged powerlines and brought down trees, including at Williamstown, where a 70-year-old man had to be cut free from a ute on Tuesday. During a period of three days, rainfall totals have exceeded 30 millimetres on Eyre and Yorke peninsulas and in the Mid North, 40mm on Kangaroo Island and 80mm in the Adelaide Hills. But the Riverland and Murraylands received far less — with the Bureau of Meteorology recording totals of only a few millimetres in the former, and just over 10mm in the latter according to the ABC. Along the Fleurieu Peninsula, the stone causeway leading to the heritage-listed Second Valley jetty received significant damage during the storm. “The jetty stood up well but the causeway is badly damaged and being fenced off so people can’t access it.” That was one of several South Australian jetties to have been destroyed by storms this winter, according to the local Mayor Mr Houston who said repairing the Second Valley causeway would be a “quite a big job”. “The Department of Transport were out there last week looking at it and are on it already but now there’s been further damage,” he said. “Because it’s heritage-listed, of course, with the stonework — that’s another complication. Only certain people can work on it.” Jetties and roads have been closed along parts of Eyre Peninsula, and the Far West Aboriginal Sporting Complex was surrounded by saltwater as huge tides rolled in. “At Port Lincoln wharf we got up to about 2.4 metres at high tide,” the Bureau of Meteorology’s Christie Johnson said. “The normal highest sort of tide we would get without the storm surge is about two metres, so we got 40 centimetres above that.” While the rain may have been music to the ears of some of the state’s farmers, Grain Producers SA chair John Gladigau said the patchy falls were “widespread but not huge in quantity”. Mr Gladigau said subsoils were mostly dry, and that the strong winds that had accompanied the rain had been “devastating to emerging crops”.
Greek Tribune Adelaide, South Australia
© 2021 Greek Community Tribune All Rights Reserved

Wild weather causes widespread damage in

South Australia

August 2025 Wild weather across South Australia has damaged coastal infrastructure but farmers will need far more rain in coming months if the state’s current grain crop is to secure a “miraculous recovery”, a leading grower says. A cold front pushed across South Australia on Wednesday, causing a storm surge and bringing strong winds and rain over agricultural areas. The front was part of a more protracted burst of wild weather that has kept emergency services busy earlier in July. The weather has damaged powerlines and brought down trees, including at Williamstown, where a 70-year-old man had to be cut free from a ute on Tuesday. During a period of three days, rainfall totals have exceeded 30 millimetres on Eyre and Yorke peninsulas and in the Mid North, 40mm on Kangaroo Island and 80mm in the Adelaide Hills. But the Riverland and Murraylands received far less — with the Bureau of Meteorology recording totals of only a few millimetres in the former, and just over 10mm in the latter according to the ABC. Along the Fleurieu Peninsula, the stone causeway leading to the heritage-listed Second Valley jetty received significant damage during the storm. “The jetty stood up well but the causeway is badly damaged and being fenced off so people can’t access it.” That was one of several South Australian jetties to have been destroyed by storms this winter, according to the local Mayor Mr Houston who said repairing the Second Valley causeway would be a “quite a big job”. “The Department of Transport were out there last week looking at it and are on it already but now there’s been further damage,” he said. “Because it’s heritage-listed, of course, with the stonework — that’s another complication. Only certain people can work on it.” Jetties and roads have been closed along parts of Eyre Peninsula, and the Far West Aboriginal Sporting Complex was surrounded by saltwater as huge tides rolled in. “At Port Lincoln wharf we got up to about 2.4 metres at high tide,” the Bureau of Meteorology’s Christie Johnson said. “The normal highest sort of tide we would get without the storm surge is about two metres, so we got 40 centimetres above that.” While the rain may have been music to the ears of some of the state’s farmers, Grain Producers SA chair John Gladigau said the patchy falls were “widespread but not huge in quantity”. Mr Gladigau said subsoils were mostly dry, and that the strong winds that had accompanied the rain had been “devastating to emerging crops”.
Greek Tribune Adelaide, South Australia