Powerful Tropical Cyclone Zelia Hits Australia’s Iron Ore Hub

Tropical Cyclone Zelia made landfall on Australia’s west coast on Friday, the weather bureau said, lashing the world’s largest iron ore hub with heavy rain and wind gusts up to 290 kph (180 mph).

The eye of the storm crossed the coast east of Port Hedland just after 12 p.m. (0400 GMT) as a category five cyclone, the highest rating on the scale.

It then moved south and weakened to a category four, sparing the town’s population center from its most destructive winds.

“This is a very dangerous system that will cause significant impact and is causing impacts as we speak,” Matthew Collopy, a forecaster with Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology said.

Australia’s Iron Ore Hub Faces Strongest Cyclone Since 2007

Cyclone Zelia is the most severe storm to hit the Pilbara coast since Cyclone Ilsa in April 2023.

The bureau warned the system could bring record-breaking rainfall for the resource-rich region in the state of Western Australia, with up to 300 mm (11.8 inches) of rainfall expected in the next 24 hours and 500 mm over the next three days.

Port Hedland’s port, the world’s biggest iron ore export point, closed on Wednesday, while the ports of Dampier and Varanus Island, a gathering and processing hub for oil and gas, were shut down on Thursday evening. Cape Lambert was also shut.

Port Hedland is used by BHP Group, Fortescue and billionaire Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting, while the Dampier and Cape Lambert ports ship iron ore from Rio Tinto.

BHP and Fortescue said separately that their Port Hedland operations had been paused for safety and that teams had been instructed to shelter at home or at camp. Fortescue said it had also closed its Iron Bridge mining operations and canceled non-essential travel to Pilbara sites.

Rio said it had cleared its Cape Lambert and Dampier port operations and there were no longer any ships or trains operating at its ports, and reiterated an earlier statement that its first-quarter shipments would be affected by weather events.

“The company is working to mitigate impacts and will provide operational updates as appropriate,” Rio said in a statement.

All three of Australia’s iron ore miners are scheduled to report financial results next week.

Iron ore futures prices rose on Friday and were on track for a weekly gain, supported by heightened concerns over the cyclone-led supply disruptions in Australia.

Iron ore is the primary raw material used to make steel.

Port Hedland’s 15,000 residents, most of whom are mining company employees, have been advised to seek shelter indoors, while non-essential staff have been moved to safe locations.

Some supermarkets have been closed, ABC News reported, after essential supplies ran out as people stocked up.

(Reporting by Renju Jose and Christine Chen in Sydney; additional reporting by Melanie Burton in Melbourne; editing by Jamie Freed and Kim Coghill)