Stewards called the meeting off at 4pm, just four races into a bumper nine-race card due to ongoing storm activity.

The remaining five races were originally all put back one as stewards hoped the storms would pass but they hit again shortly before the running of the fifth event.

Horses were just about to be loaded into the barriers for race five before another electrical storm arrived.

Horses were sent back to the stables and stewards spoke with jockeys and MTC officials before calling the meeting off.

Southern District chief steward John Davidson said the decision was made in the best interests of both horse and jockey.

“We had no electrical activity for probably 25-30 minutes and we threw the apprentices up to go for this race and we had two or three lightning strikes behind the grandstand,” Davidson said.

“The forecast says there is more coming, to what extent we don’t know and it is very, very hit and miss so in the interests and safety of the riders, we think the only decision we could have made was to postpone the remaining races.

“Safety is always paramount.”

Davidson said stewards gave the meeting every chance to proceed.

“We delayed the race considerably, we thought we had the most of it behind us, otherwise we wouldn’t have sent the apprentices out,” he said.

“But they just arrived at the barriers and there was two or three strikes behind the grandstand and clearly once that’s around, our hands are tied and all we want to do is make sure everyone goes home in one piece.”

MTC race again on Saturday with a six-race Country TAB meeting. The nominations for all six races have been extended until 11am on Tuesday to allow horses that missed out on a run on Monday, a chance to run on Saturday.

Trainers are hopeful that Racing NSW will add more races and prizemoney to the card, given the washout of Monday’s meeting.

MTC chief executive Scott Sanbrook understood the decision.

“It’s always disappointing to lose races but with the storm that hit, the stewards had no alternative,” Sanbrook said.

“We’ve been lucky all day because it rained everywhere but here but unfortunately in the end we were in the wrong spot at the wrong time. The most important thing is rider and horse safety and that’s obviously what the stewards have taken as their main consideration.”

The weather forecast is not favourable for Saturday’s Christmas Party race meeting at MTC with showers forecast for later in the week.