Termite swarm hits Kensington

An unsuspecting local couple were left running for cover after a plague of angry termites swarmed their Kensington home in November, forcing them to turn off all the lights and batten down the hatches.

Madi Thompson and her partner were sitting in their backyard peacefully enjoying the sunset one warm evening, when they decided to turn on some lights as it was getting dark.

Almost immediately after doing so, she said a dark cloud appeared accompanied by a “menacing buzz” …

“We turned on the string lights which was super-nice for 30 seconds, then all of a sudden there were hundreds – and my partner said thousands – of flying insects,” Ms Thompson said.

“At first, we thought they were moths, then maybe flies.”

“We were covering our ears because we didn’t want them to go in our ears or mouth.”

After running indoors and shutting the door, a quick Google search revealed that the pests were termites.

“Old houses here aren’t really tight, there’s vents and we Googled that they could come in through down lights!” Ms Thompson said.

“We kept Googling and it said turn off all the lights off and close the doors.”

Ms Thompson said around 50 termites still got into their house, forcing the couple to get creative.

“We kept the bathroom light on to attract them away from where we were sleeping, and by the morning, only around 20 were left in the kitchen and in our dog’s food bowl,” she said.

Ms Thompson said they called pest control almost immediately but were advised that the exterminators would not need to come for an assessment until January because it takes time for termites to damage property.

Ms Thompson followed up with a post on the Kennington Good Karma Network Facebook group because the pest control company said it was likely there was a nearby colony.

“Pest control said it was probably a nearby colony that was getting too big and needed to relocate,” she said.

“I wanted to warn people nearby because they said it’s probably in a neighbouring house. I’m guessing someone needs to check their house.” •