Cyclone Dominic

Lightning over the Pilbara sky

Our middle boy and our neighbours' children having a play in the street before the rain.

Rain clouds brewing. The colours are so vivid.

Well, so much for good intentions. I did hope to get around to jotting down a couple of lines and including a few pictures of in and around TP before now, but to no avail. So now I have to catch up on the few things that have happened over the past couple of weeks.

Our big news this week is Cyclone Dominic, which passed by the coast at Onslow and dumped four days of lovely rain on our town over the Australia Day long weekend. It meant that we spent a lot of time indoors, but when the rain abated the kids were at least able to play a little outdoors, including running madly around in a downpour the other day. It also cooled the temperatures down considerably and I was able to turn the air-con off and open windows and let in the fresh air.

We are lucky in TP because we usually benefit from the passing cyclones without the resultant damage caused by the high winds. We often pray for cyclones just so we get a great downpour. The temperatures lower and a lot of the local swimming pools and creeks fill up, not to mention the lush new growth in the bush.

In our first summer here, four cyclones passed by and we had the best rains. Since then, there have been as many cyclones, but not as much rain as that first year. Last year, Cyclone George was headed straight for TP after passing the coast above Port Hedland as a category 5 (we even went into Red alert and were confined indoors for the duraion) but then it slowed down and abated as it continued further inland. Tragically three people, living near Port Hedland, died as a result, including two unfortunate workers at a local fly-in, fly-out mining camp. So one can never unestimate the almighty power of these climatic bursts.

In the lead up and aftermath to cyclone Dominic, there were some terrific thunderstorms. We lost power during some of that time, but the lightning shows were compensation. I just love a good thunderstorm. It reminds me of the awesome storms we used to have in Arusha. As long as I'm safely inside and dry, I love them. The picture above was taken by a good friend who was out on the weekend at Mt Sheila (another magic place here in the Pilbara).

So now the clouds are clearing and the temperature is rising, and we're looking forward to the next cyclonic event before the summer is over.