Yesterdays #storm in Sydney stripped North Curl Curl Beach of its sand. What it revealed was an amazing time capsule of etchings written by people following past storm events. A thread 1/7
First up, the 1974 storm (also known as the Sygna storm). The biggest storm cluster to hit the NSW coast in recent times by far, famously causing the break up of the Norwegian bulk carrier Sygna at Stockton Beach 2/7 
Next, the 1978 “Egger house” storm, which resulted in the collapse of a cliffside house on Ocean View Drive Wamberal, owned by the Egger family and led to a famous court case on the right to use coastal structures to protect from erosion 3/7
The 1997 “Mothers Day storm”, which still to this day has the largest wave heights ever recorded in Sydney, with a peak significant wave height of 8.4 m 4/7
And now in 2021, with locals already marking this recent event 5/7
The cool thing is that these storms clearly show up in wave reanalyses data too, as shown by this ranking I did in 2010 using the cumulative wave energy of the storm events based on ERA-40 data (1956-2002) rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/CFBXUTMP… 6/7
Its amazing what lies under the sand! 7/7
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