Streets turned into icy rivers during severe storms

Australia’s spring season is underway, but severe thunderstorms made one part of the country look like a winter wonderland on Thursday, while also producing a lesser-known hazard.

Severe thunderstorms brought torrential rainfall, strong wind gusts and abundant hail to portions of South Australia on Thursday, and for some locations just outside of the state's capital of Adelaide, so much hail fell that it began to look more like a winter wonderland than spring.

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) issued a severe thunderstorm warning for the Adelaide region as storms began to get feisty late Wednesday into early Thursday.

Adelaide avoided some of the worst impacts from these strong storms. However, its northern suburbs were not as fortunate.

According to AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist and Lead International Forecaster Jason Nicholls, Fairview, a northeastern Adelaide suburb, received 0.87 of an inch (22.2 mm) of rain in a rather short amount of time. Considering the region typically receives less than 2 inches (50 mm) of rainfall on average for the month of October, about half a month's rainfall in just a few hours led to some serious issues.

Videos from around the region showed floodwaters swamping roadways and inundating businesses. In some cases chunks of ice were seen floating in the water.

As of Friday afternoon, local time, South Australia's State Emergency Service had already been called out to around 1,300 incidents across the state. No injuries or fatalities were reported.

A complicating factor for some of these roadways were storm drains that became blocked by an overabundance of small hail.

Elsewhere, so much small hail fell that grassy and paved areas alike were completely covered. One local official, Labor MP Lee Odenwalder, even went on Twitter to describe a scene at a shopping center as a "winter wonderland."

Strong winds also howled across the state on Thursday. According to Nicholls, winds averaged more than 37 mph (60 km/h) with gusts higher than 56 mph (90 km/h) at times on Thursday.

These strong winds likely contributed to power outages across portions of the state. At least eight public schools had to be closed Thursday afternoon due to a combination of power outages and flooding, according to Australia's ABC News.

In addition to the risks more typically presented with severe thunderstorms, Thursday's storms also created a lesser-known hazard called "thunderstorm asthma."

In the state of Victoria, located just east of South Australia, the Victorian Department of Health issued the first high risk alert of the season for epidemic thunderstorm asthma on Thursday. According to the agency, thunderstorm asthma is thought to be triggered by a unique combination of high amounts of grass pollen in the air and a certain type of thunderstorm.

This phenomenon can trigger severe asthma symptoms for people who have asthma or hay fever.

Australia is well into its spring season, which is when severe storms tend to become more prevalent.

A strong system in the upper levels of the atmosphere spun up an area of low pressure along the coast of South Australia, which was able to strengthen as it approached the Adelaide area, Nicholls said.

"This set the stage for conditions conducive for producing strong thunderstorms with areas of heavy rain and hail across southeast South Australia on Thursday."

The same storm that produced treacherous weather for the Adelaide area will shift eastward to end the week.

"The cold front associated with the storm can produce locally strong thunderstorms between Sydney and Brisbane into Saturday," Nicholls said.

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