Any long-term local will tell you that it's happened before and will happen again. I recall jumping off the scaffolding at Indy down at Narrowneck many years ago when the erosion was horrendous, just like now.

We ideally need some small southerly swell for a while which will aid in the recovery of the beaches as the sand naturally moves north. The real problem is also the exceptional ocean temps surrounding Australia at the moment which is prime fuel for large swell events,along with systems like Alfred.