The Australian floods peak

Rescuers help Australia flood victims as waters recede

Rescue workers in Australia are working to help people affected by floods which have inundated two eastern states.

The Australian state of Queensland is continuing to suffer floods in the wake of tropical cyclone Oswald.

BBC,

29 January, 2013

In Queensland, helicopters rescued more than 1,000 people stranded in the city of Bundaberg as the Burnett River burst its banks, flooding 2,000 homes.

In New South Wales, Grafton escaped the worst of the flooding as the Clarence River peaked below the city's levees.

The waters are now beginning to drop gradually as troops prepare for a mammoth recovery effort and clean-up.

Tropical Cyclone Oswald, which triggered the flooding, is now heading out to sea south of Sydney.

Tens of thousands were left isolated or displaced by the torrent, which peaked in most areas late on Tuesday.

Four people are now known to have died in the severe weather, after a toddler who was hit by a falling tree in Brisbane died on Monday.

It comes two years after severe flooding in southern Queensland, including in the state capital Brisbane, that left 35 people dead and tens of thousands of homes flooded.

"We're planning to have some troops on the ground hopefully within the next 24 hours. It looks like waters will recede and we'll be able to gain access," Brigadier Greg Bilton told reporters.

'Dangerous situation'

"Severe major flooding is being experienced in the Burnett [river] catchment area," the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) said in its latest statement.

It added: "Record major flooding continues at Bundaberg with the river rising slowly above 9.5m (31ft) in the last few hours."

The Burnett river is also running more than 1.5m (4.9ft) higher than the last serious flooding in December 2010.

State Premier Campbell Newman called the scene at Bundaberg "extraordinary"

Queensland Police Minister Jack Dempsey said that the flood levels will be some of the highest recorded for the whole of the Bundaberg and Burnett region.

"The main priority at the moment on the ground is life and we really do implore people to go to the highest points, listen to the emergency service workers and their directions," he said.

Some 7,500 people are reported to have been displaced in the city of Bundaberg, with more than 1,500 taking shelter in evacuation centres.

About 1,000 people were plucked from the roofs of their homes by helicopters in daring evening rescues after rivers broke their banks late on Monday.

Two air force transport planes are evacuating patients from the local hospital and Prime Minister Julia Gillard said 100 military personnel were being sent to help out.

Queensland State Premier Campbell Newman has praised the civilian and military rescue crews, saying their bravery was "what saved the day".

The BoM has warned that "major flooding is continuing in the Logan River", with the towns of Waterford and Eagleby now threatened.

In Brisbane, low-lying parts of the central business district were flooded but the impact on residential areas was less than expected, ABC News said.

Officials in the city said that the flooding was not as bad as in 2011, when 22,000 homes were flooded and the damage to infrastructure cost $400m (£250m).

However, Brisbane's Lord Mayor, Graham Quirk, told the Herald Sun newspaper that high tides in coming days would see river levels rise again.

"At this stage anyway, it's good news," he said.

Brisbane residents have been advised to cut down on water use and boil drinking water, after the floods inundated treatment plants. The authorities have warned that some suburbs may run out of water on Wednesday.

In New South Wales, parts of which saw torrential rain on Monday as the cyclone moved south, 2,500 people were told to evacuate from the city of Grafton, where levees were threatened by rising water.

"On Thursday and Friday we were nearly in drought conditions. Here we are on Tuesday morning talking about the biggest flood on the history books," Mayor Richie Williamson told reporters.

Although river levels peaked at a record 8.1m this was below the city's protective levees, prompting the state premier Barry O'Farrell to say: "It does appear as though the worst of it is over".

The authorities estimate that more than 40,000 people have been isolated by floodwaters in the state's north, although no homes are reported to have been damaged there.

Northern NSW towns at the mercy of break-neck floods

The Australian,

30 January, 2013

FLOODS of a magnitude "never seen by a white man" powered through the rivers of northern NSW yesterday, washing out towns and isolating 41,000 people.

The Clarence river, swollen to look as wide as the Mississippi but moving at break-neck speed, stopped centimetres short of devastating Grafton after a herculean effort to reinforce the levees with sandbags and pumps.

Down river, residents of the small community of Ulmarra watched in horror as the Clarence swept through a place whose levees had always held, within minutes swamping their homes and livelihoods and leaving them drinking on the veranda of the local pub with their feet dangling in the water.

Bernie Crammond lost everything in the waist-high water and has been put up for a week at the pub while he figures out what to do next.

"I'm a pensioner, I've got nothing, no insurance," Mr Crammond said. "I didn't expect this and by the time anybody knew what was happening it was too late."

Clarence Valley mayor Richard Williamson said of the flood threat in Grafton: "It's a sight that has never been seen by white man."

Similar scenes played out across rural and coastal NSW, with 14 rivers flooding towns including Murwillumbah and Lismore. As in Grafton, though, mitigation efforts spared them from the worst - so far.

As the waters continued to move, new warnings emerged. Late yesterday, the State Emergency Service issued a flood evacuation order for parts of Maclean on the Clarence.

An evacuation order was also issued for Harwood Island, just north of Maclean, last night. Roads connecting the island - home to 350 people - were cut off and the SES was moving people across the river to Maclean by boat throughout the night.

The weather system that was once Cyclone Oswald whipped up huge seas that damaged the marina at Coffs Harbour and, in Port Macquarie, produced extraordinary foamy waves as the aerated seawater reacted with algae. Further south, Sydney saw traffic snarls and local flooding as a month's worth of rain was dumped in a night. The state and federal governments announced 10 national disaster zones, with more declarations expected.

Premier Barry O'Farrell visited Grafton just as floodwaters started to recede. While 2000 evacuations were ordered around the town, most houses were spared from a record river peak due to a system of levees installed in the 1970s and a few rows of sandbags.

Fry Street resident Aaron Hancock said the town "dodged a bullet" but he might have been referring to his home, directly behind the levee, which stood as an almost-dry example of the town's saving grace: "My home, hundreds and hundreds of homes, they'd all be under if it wasn't for this wall.

"I've lived by the river in Grafton all my life and this is like nothing else, the biggest one I've ever seen," Mr Hancock said.

Not every home was so lucky. In South Grafton, Leon Flaherty relinquished the bottom floor of his home to the river.

"It's the worst I've seen in my home," Mr Flaherty said. "It's just what the river does."

Insurance claims across the state are estimated to be at least $10 million. but NSW has, so far, been spared the loss of life endured in Queensland, although rescues have included three people trapped on a roof at Fingal Head, four trapped in a submerged 4WD in Bellingen and another four in Friday Creek at Grafton

Water everywhere, but not enough to drink

BRISBANE'S flood drama has given way to a drinking water crisis, with Premier Campbell Newman warning that taps could run dry if people do not cut their consumption.

The Australian,

30 Janaury, 2013

The perverse situation developed yesterday, as minor flooding broke out from a swollen Brisbane River, when the city's main water treatment plant was knocked out by silt from the inundated Lockyer Valley, west of the city.

As the evacuation of the stricken town of Bundaberg continued with the airlift of 131 hospital patients to Brisbane by the RAAF and military and civilian helicopters flying non-stop to reach trapped people, Mr Newman urged residents of the capital to limit water use to cooking, drinking and washing.

Brisbane's consumption had to fall by nearly half from the normal level of 450ML a day to preserve supply through the 48 hour-period it would take to bring the water treatment plant at Mount Crosby back on line.

If people did not co-operate, he said, urban reservoirs would be emptied by today, leaving some suburbs on the city's southside with no mains water.

"There are parts of Brisbane, I am advised, that overnight could run dry," Mr Newman said. "So this is very serious."

Lord Mayor Graham Quirk urged people to revert to the drought-time practice of showering for no longer than four minutes.

"We don't need to panic around this, but we do want common sense," he said.

Mr Newman added that exception would be made for people who had to clean up flood damage. The effectively mothballed Gold Coast desalination plant had been cranked up to pump 40ML a day into the water grid, while discharges from Brisbane's main Wivenhoe Dam would help flush the river and relieve clogging at the treatment plant. Mr Newman said the facility had been unable to cope with river water four times muddier than the water that went down the river during the flood two years ago that inundated more than 20,000 properties in Brisbane and Ipswich.

The neighbouring cities were spared yesterday after the Bremer and Brisbane rivers peaked at lower flood levels than feared.

The Bremer topped out at 13.9m at the Ipswich CBD gauge, short of the 15m predicted and nearly 6m below the 2011 flood mark. Only 35 homes had water "over the floorboards" in West Ipswich.

The nearby suburb of Goodna, badly struck by the last flood, escaped with no houses damaged.

The flood peaked at 2m in the Brisbane CBD at about noon local time, 0.6m below that forecast.

The focus of concern remained Bundaberg, where the Burnett River hit a record 9.5m, flooding 2000 homes. The force of the torrent ripped one unoccupied house off its stumps in Bundaberg North. Both bridges across the river were submerged, and RAAF Hercules transport aircraft shuttled hospital patients to Brisbane in an operation that lasted most of the day.

Police reinforcements were on their way to the town after four properties were hit by suspected looters, and two other cases emerged in flood-bound Gympie.

Mr Newman said looting was the "lowest act" committed by "grubs". In Queensland, stealing during times of declared natural disaster attracts a premium penalty of up to 10 years' jail.

Julia Gillard pledged that the state's hard-pressed emergency services would be backed up by the military for as long as required