The Great Storm (Home and Away)

Palm Beach provides the setting of the fictional town of Summer Bay, in which The Great Storm occurs.

The Great Storm is a group of four episodes of the Australian soap opera Home and Away, broadcast between 5 and 8 September 2011 on Network Seven, during the show's twenty-fourth season. The episodes focused on a severe storm which crosses over the fictional town of Summer Bay and leaves several of the serial's characters in danger. Home and Away's producer Cameron Welsh first announced intention to screen the storyline in June 2011. It was self-described to be the "biggest stunt/disaster storyline" to ever feature in the serial. In the months prior to its screening, the cast filmed a series of stunts for the episodes on a shoot lasting eleven days. It marked the first time that Home and Away used a wide combination of special effects such as FX, green screen, wind machines and rain machines. Along with more time than usual spent filming the block of episodes, the storyline became Home and Away's most expensive to date. Welsh said that the use of machinery became problematic during filming so additional dialogue recordings were added to the scenes during post-production.

The storyline was promoted by the Seven Network and overseas broadcaster Channel 5, in the form of televisual adverts. One of the serial's cast members revealed that one character would die in the disaster, but details were kept under wraps until transmission. The storyline follows the struggle the characters encounter when the storm hits. Various characters become stranded in different locations while the majority take shelter at Summer Bay High where an evacuation centre is set up. The characters of Harvey Ryan (Marcus Graham) and Roo Stewart (Georgie Parker) become stranded when their boat capsizes. While Romeo Smith (Luke Mitchell) takes on the role of the "hero" and tries to save lives. Other segments include the character of Leah Patterson-Baker (Ada Nicodemou) nearly losing her unborn child and the roof collapsing at Summer Bay High leaving the characters of Colleen Smart (Lyn Collingwood), Bianca Scott (Lisa Gormley) and Heath Braxton (Dan Ewing) trapped in the wreckage. When the storm passes guest character Tegan Callahan (Saskia Burmeister) is killed in a car accident.

The episodes rated well on the Seven Network averaging at 1.131 million viewers for the whole block of episodes. The ratings fared less in the UK staying below the million mark.[citation needed] The storyline was not popular with Erin Miller from TV Week who opined that the special effects used ruined many scenes.