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The stretch of coast around Lorne, south west of Melbourne, is not where people expect violent thunderstorms. On Thursday afternoon a slow moving storm came in over the Otway region close to town and dropped a significant flash flood. The storm was small and localised, focused on the country south west of Lorne between Lorne and Sugarloaf, and it moved in from Bass Strait, dumped its rain and decayed. Down at Wye River the water rose fast enough to sweep away at least 10 to 20 vehicles. There were no fatalities. A weather station near Mt Cowley, inside the affected area, recorded 175.4 mm of rain in the six hours to 3 pm. The flooding was confined to the Wye River, Kennett River and Cumberland Creek areas and the Otway Ranges close to the coast. It shows how much water a slow storm can squeeze out of a small patch of coast when it refuses to move on.
