Sydney airport has been hit with wind gusts as high as 80km/h overnight and another of 61km/h at 11.50am, forcing the Airport to operate on a single runway.
The State Emergency Service, SES received over 300 calls for help since the strong winds started last night, with most calls coming from Camden, Campbelltown and Badgery’s Creek, where winds peaked at 104km/h early this morning.
Airservices Australia had earlier said it was expecting to reduce the operative runways to one, owing to strong westerly crosswinds, which is causing most flights to leave on time, with a few cancelled.
The strong winds have led to extreme fire danger ratings as multiple New South Wales towns have been hit with emergency warnings.
Total fire bans remain in place for the Greater Sydney and Illawarra regions.
There are currently 82 blazes burning across NSW, with six burning at emergency levels.
In another development, residents of Sydney this morning woke to closed roads, fallen trees and wires down, after wind gusts of over 100km/h ripped through the city overnight.
The gusts brought down multiple trees and powerlines around Sydney.
Reports say that about 13,000 homes are currently without power, while multiple roads are blocked by fallen trees.
As of 6am, the following roads were already closed:
At Punchbowl, Canterbury Road is closed in both directions between Stacey Street and Punchbowl Road.
At West Hoxton, Cowpasture Road is closed northbound approaching Hoxton Park Road.
At Hammondville, Heathcote Road is closed in both directions between Bardia Parade and Keato Avenue.
Some buses were also diverted away from their normal routes, causing some delays.
Extreme wind gusts over 100km/h has however eased this morning, but, wind gusts still remained stronger than usual.