Commuter chaos as streets flooded during wild Sydney storm

The intense storms dumped 47 millimetres of rain on Guildford within 30 minutes while Parramatta, Auburn and Baulkham Hills all received more than 1mm a minute for half-an-hour, the Bureau of Meteorology said.

Close to 40mm fell at Sydney Olympic Park in the 40 minutes to 7pm.

T1 Sydney Trains said there were some delays to services because of lightning strikes damaging equipment at Blacktown.

More than 40,000 properties are without power after the intense thunderstorms dumped heavy rain and hail across Sydney and surrounding areas.

Houses could be without power overnight

Endeavour Energy warned the damage was so extensive that some of the 29,000 homes in western Sydney without power wouldn’t have it restored until Saturday morning.

“We have had over 150 electrical hazards reported since the storm hit,” Endeavour Energy said in a statement.

“Emergency crews are patrolling affected areas to make safe and switch around damaged parts of the network to safely restore power supply to as many customers as possible.”

Ausgrid says power is out at least 12,500 properties in the city’s east and north.

A severe thunderstorm warning for heavy rain, damaging winds and large hailstones remains in place for Sydney, Wollongong, Gosford and Maitland.

The power issues also affected the start of the AFLW match between GWS Giants and North Melbourne when two light towers at Drummoyne went out.

The game eventually got underway at 8pm, 45 minutes late.

– with AAP