February 7, 2025
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Vic Open tees off
(Ivan Kemp) 456107_10
Golfers of all abilities have taken over the 13th Beach Golf Links as the Vic Open returns for its 12th year. The major golfing event kicked off with the all-abilities Golf Clinic organised by genU and Golf Australia on Wednesday, February 5, from 11am to 1pm, with the main tournaments taking place from Thursday, February 6, to Sunday, February 9. Women and men will battle it out on 13th Beach’s Beach and Creek courses for equal shares of a total $400,000 in prize money across both fields. Geoff from genU is pictured taking a shot during the all-abilities event, turn to page 24 for more photos from the Golf Clinic.
Storm winds unleash fury By Jena Carr Geelong erupted into chaos overnight on Sunday as lightning, wind, rain, and hail shook the region, leaving properties damaged and trees uprooted. Lightning cracked across the skies for over three hours on Sunday evening, followed by heavy rain and wild winds across Geelong, the Bellarine Peninsula and Surf Coast. Geelong and Lara were hit particularly hard with flash flooding, with downed trees causing property damage and hail stones of 2cm to 4cm, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. Some 63mm of rain was recorded at Lara, 52mm at Avalon Airport, 48mm at Clunes and 47mm at Geelong. An SES spokesperson said VICSES Barwon South West volunteers were called to almost 500 requests for assistance (RFAs) between 10am on Sunday, February 2, and 10am on Monday, February 3. “(Calls were) largely relating to trees down (222), building damage (169) and flood (83),” they said. “Local volunteers have cleared almost 300 of these RFAs during this period,
Left: A tree fell over onto shop awnings outside the Little Pakington complex along Pakington Street during Sunday’s storm. (Jena Carr) Right: Winds blew the roof off Target Rifle Geelong’s building. (Target Rifle Geelong)
and volunteer crews are still out responding aided by other VICSES and CFA crews.” Damage reports included a tree blown over onto shop awnings outside the Little Pakington complex along Pakington Street and power lost to traffic lights at the Waiora Avenue and Jasmine Street intersection along Ballarat Road in Geelong West.
Target Rifle Geelong was one of many buildings damaged across the region, with winds blowing off sheets of the club’s corrugated iron roof over the footpath next to the building. Secretary and treasurer Bianca Waldron said the City of Greater Geelong council shut down the building and some of the surrounding area
at around 1pm on Monday. “We lost a few things like couches, chairs, tables, and carpets, so it’s just a matter of assessing everything,” she said. “We lost about 90 per cent of our roofing, and that’s probably a 40-metre span by 10 to 15 metres, so we have lost a fair amount of roofing. “There’s a footpath right next to our building, so we wanted to try and clear some of the roofing from there because that gets used a lot throughout the day by walkers and bike riders. “We were alerted to the damage at about 7pm on Sunday after a member of the public was walking past (the club) and got caught up in the storm. She was seeking shelter in our veranda area when the roof came off.” The storm also led to power network damage in Geelong, with close to 2411 Powercor customers waiting for power to be restored on Monday. Powercor also deployed a Mobile Emergency Response Vehicle (MERV) to Geelong on Monday to provide on-ground advice to community members impacted by outages. - with AAP
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