Pioneer Park copped a deluge as rain pelted down on the western side of the river on Wednesday evening.

The Bureau of Meteorology recorded wind gusts of 65km/h and 47mm of rain in just more than an hour at its Dubbo weather station.

Anecdotal reports from the city’s west and to its north suggest an even higher intensity of rainfall.

Dubbo City Council sporting facilities manager Wes Giddings was out yesterday to inspect the costly damage done.

The hockey complex was out of action yesterday because wind had brought down its overhead netting, Mr Giddings said.

He said replacing it would not be cheap.

The netting protects the synthetic, water-based surface from attacks from galahs and cockatoos.

Their beaks did damage to the Sydney Olympics-standard surface in the past, prompting the council to invest in the netting.

Mr Giddings planned to have the netting removed in time for tomorrow’s registration day.

A new net would be ordered and in the meantime council staff would keep an eye on the complex to make sure the cockatoos had not flown in.

The rain’s intensity was unwelcome in West Dubbo, but two

kilometres further east it could have made real trouble.

Instead, Apex Oval and its $4.5 million stormwater harvesting project experienced smaller falls and no wind.

The weather event caused no further damage and council’s contractor continued the construction of a 10-megalitre water reservoir, Mr Giddings was happy to report.

A wet spring and summer has already wreaked havoc with the project’s timeline.

The council ruled out play on Apex Oval - the home of Macquarie Raiders rugby league and Dubbo Rhinos rugby clubs - for the entire 2012 season late last year.

Then a storm last month resulted in water pooling in the large hole in the ground and lifting the crate components of the tank.

Workers had finished re-packing crates on the north-west corner and only had two eastern corners to go, which shouldn’t be as big a job, Mr Giddings said.

The contractor had also started stacking the next layer of crates on top in the past 10 days, he said.

About 1500 crates still had to be built, and then the bladder would be laid on top, before the tank site was back-filled, he said.

Mr Giddings anticipated this would be done in March, at

which time he would conduct more tours of the site for media and the public.