The Category 3 storm crossed the coast overnight southwest of Dampier, with winds of up to 195 kilometres an hour.

BHP Billiton, Santos, Woodside Petroleum and Chevron Australia all shut down offshore oil rigs yesterday, while ports at Dampier and Port Headland were closed.

Most of the companies started preparing for the cyclone on the weekend, with Santos stopping production from its offshore Mutineer-Exeter oil field on Sunday.

Production was also halted at Chevron’s Barrow Island field and BHP’s Griffin field. BHP disconnected the production vessel from the Griffin drilling port and moved it out of the way from the cyclone’s projected path.

Rigs at Woodside’s Legendre field and North West Shelf project were also moved out of the cyclone’s path yesterday. But the company continued operating its onshore LNG plant at Karratha throughout the cyclone.

More than 1500 people were evacuated from low-lying areas along the state’s northwest coast in response to the cyclone.

Clare was moving inland and southwest with winds easing to 170km/hr at 6am (WST) this morning.

The West Australian coast is normally hit by two cyclones each year between November and April.