04 February 2009

Disaster Area

The Big Wet has hit with a vengeance in North Queensland. We have quite a large state and over half of it is under water thanks to the monsoonal rains and a cyclone, with another cyclone threatening later this week.

As you may have realised from other Australian blogs, notably Merle and Peter, we have huge fires in Victoria and South Australia, yet further north, the State of Queensland is 62% under water and has been declared a disaster area.

At first, the people up north welcomed the rain as a definite drought breaker, but now they wish it would stop raining. Homes are under water, the only transport is by boat and the insurance claims will be enormous. Yet, in South East Queensland although we've had rain, our dams have dropped to 45%.

Below is a picture of the town of Ingham which gives you a small idea of what the floods are like.

Those in the northern hemisphere are having a big freeze, the southern states of Australia are burning and Queensland is very wet. Global warming or natural climate change?


11 comments:

Liz Hinds said...

It must be so horrible having your home ruined by flood water.

I hope you stay safe from fire and flood!

Anonymous said...

Awwww, what a disaster!

Your right: we're having a cold and snowy winter in Norway and actually lots of snow in Great Britain and mid Europe too. Thats at least not that normal.

Hootin Anni said...

I just read about this all on Yahoo News....and alligators in the streets? Do stay dry if you're in this flood zone!!!

Unknown said...

Monsoonal rains, a cyclone and wild fires!This doesn't sound good for my Aussie friends. I'm adding all to my prayer list.

Gattina said...

Oh my goodness ! I have seen the fire on TV but not the water ! that looks terrible. I don't know if it is the global warming, I think a 100 years ago winters were very cold too and maybe summers were also very hot. Only nobody spoke about it and weathermen on TV or radio didn't exist.
I remember when I was a child I always had snow in winter and now it's all 7 years or so.

Merle said...

Dear Robyn ~~ The floods are awful aren't they? I heard three quarters of Qld was flooded. We cannot get any rain here, and the heat continues until next Monday when we expect 26 degrees which will be wonderful. Glad you enjoyed the girl witnessing the birth. etc.
Take great care, my friend, Love, Merle.

Peter said...

G'day Robyn, hope you have your water wings on the ready, I'm also guessing its pretty humid in good old Queensland now with all the cyclonic weather about.

Gledwood said...

Hells bells! I hope it misses you!

Carole Burant said...

Oh dear, it goes from one extreme to the other, doesn't it! My heart goes out to all the people affected by these floods. I do hope you're safe from them, dear Robyn!! It's -19c here right now, going down to -24c...hard to believe we're living on the same earth isn't it! lol xoxo

Anonymous said...

My heart goes out to all the people who have been effected by these floods. I imagine it's very frightening watching the water continue to rise knowing you can't do a thing about it.

Walker said...

Thats terrible.
The world weather is so out of whack we don;t have time to adjust to the changes.
To bad they can't pump that water to where its needed to put out those fires.