Cyclone Debbie: 'Idiot' caught surfing in giant storm

A satellite image of the storm. (NOAA)

As Australian authorities appealed for people to stay indoors away from the fury of Cyclone Debbie, this man wanted to go surfing in the eye of it.

The man, who wandered into the background of a live cross as Channel Nine reported from Airlie Beach, stood buffeted by wind with a boogie board under his arm contemplating the wild waves.

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“Oh my God, there’s someone with a boogie board going out in the ocean it would seem, so that’s obviously not a good idea at all,” said reporter Jessica Millward.

Wearing a singlet and boardshorts, the man waded into the wild waves as the cameras rolled, as a mate on the beach watched on.

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Knee deep, he turns to look back at his mate, then launches onto the board, swamped by a messy wave.

“There’s a lot of backpackers in town Karl, and I can tell you there’s obviously been a lot of cyclone parties throughout the evening and this morning because there’s a fair few inebriated people here so the authorities are out and about just warning people we are in the eye of the storm, we are certainly not through the thick of it yet,” Millward said.

“Ah hello. Hi. Ah yeah, that’s very dangerous so we might just alert some authorities as to what’s going on down. Yeah, that’s not good, that’s not smart,” she continued as he attempted to catch a wave.

Predictably, social media lit up, and the consensus was “idiot” - which is how the journalist later described the man’s actions.

Meanwhile, Channel 7 was reporting a kite surfer in Bowen had been captured surfing the winds of the cyclone on Monday off Bowen, with 7 News Mackay tweeting this footage:

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