The mop up has begun after a night of wild storms which flooded road and homes, brought down trees, and caused car crashes across NSW and Queensland.
Torrential rain in south-east Queensland killed a teenager, swept away in a car in a swollen creek south of Toowoomba.
The 14-year-old boy and two other people managed to get out of the car at Junction View, but he was washed away in the floodwaters.
The Department of Community Safety says swift water rescue crews were called to a further five incidents in the Gold Coast hinterland after cars were stranded in floodwaters.
In NSW, people can expect more extreme weather, with the Bureau of Meteorology predicting moderate to heavy rainfalls for the rest of the weekend.
No records were broken but Sydney recorded 74.8mm in 24 hours of rain in one of the busiest nights for emergency services in years.
The NSW Fire Brigade had about 500 calls for help in Sydney, mostly for fallen trees which crash onto cars and homes, and flooded basements.
SES inundated
The SES was also inundated, with nearly 1200 calls for help statewide since the storms began on Friday, while in Queensland the service received 172 calls for help overnight, 100 of them from Gold Coast residents mainly seeking help with sandbagging and temporary roof repairs.
But the real bucketing came with thunderstorms and some lightening from about 7pm (AEDT) on Saturday, and didn't let up until the early morning, the BoM said.
"It started to get heavier and heavier and continued throughout the night," Senior Forecaster Peter Zmijewski told AAP, adding that the dumping was rare but not unheard of.
"But it's not unusual to get in excess of 200mm in 24 hours in Sydney," he said.
Sydney's northern suburbs, including St Ives and Gordon, were the hardest hit.
Cars were submerged as the water rose, and six people needed to be rescued after becoming trapped in their vehicles or houses.
Eleven high dependency nursing home patients in the city's northwest had to be evacuated due to flooding.
SES crews spent a lot of the evening sandbagging, covering roofs with tarps, and responding to about 100 fallen trees.
Throughout the rest of the state, Illawarra, Goulburn and the Blue Mountains also copped a battering from the storms.
The BoM has warned motorists to take extreme care in the slippery conditions, and says the wild weather is likely to continue for most of Sunday, and will eventually ease on Tuesday
when clear skies are expected.
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