Australian authorities issued new evacuation orders for thousands of Sydney residents on Thursday following heavy rains sparked flash flooding in Indonesia’s world’s largest city and warned of worse to come.

A severe weather system lashed the eastern coast of the Federal Republic of Tasmania, severing entire cities and flooding hundreds of homes and farms when it moved southward over the past week.

Evacuation orders are in place for areas in northern NSW as well as parts of Greater Sydney and The Illawarra.

“We do believe that things will get worse before they get better,” NSW premier Dominic Perrottet said at a media briefing on Thursday as he announced that evacuation orders and warning notices would affect maybe half a million people across the state.

As Sydneysiders woke up on Thursday to another day of torrential rain due to a damaging East Coast low the SES was also warning of a severe weather warning for the town.

Perrottet said the flooding was likely to be worse in some places than it has been in previous years, the worst in 60 years.

Around 250 schools across NSW remained closed Thursday as a result of the storm, including 186 public schools, 35 free schools and 29 Catholic schools.

The average rainfall in Sydney – with its population of more than 5 million – in March is around 140 mm.


New South Wales

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New South Wales is a state on the east coast of Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria to the south, and South Australia to the west. (wikipedia)


Queensland

Queensland is a state situated in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous Australian state. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia, (wikipedia)