"tsunami-like" flood in Australia

I have to admit it's very morbidly interesting.

That looks like one terrifying flash flood. It also makes me heartily glad that my Aussie family members are in Sydney.

Wow, Australia just gets crappier by the day.

The flooded area: Big as Germany and France put together. Three times the total population of my hometown.

... It's not a very big hometown.

edited 11th Jan '11 8:43:09 AM by Iaculus

Mercy, didn't realize the flooding was that widespread.

It passed through here a few days ago. The CBD's closed due to damage for the foreseeable future, and there'll be no deliveries either. As bad as the primary destruction was, I think the long term privation will be worse.

edited 12th Jan '11 4:33:32 PM by DarkDecapodian

@Silent Stranger: We've been saying it for years: in Australia, Everything Is Trying to Kill You. This is just the latest piece of evidence.

Holy crap.

I'm actually surprised the death tolls they've been showing have been that low. Aussies really are badass.

The easiest way to survive a natural disaster is to live in a developed nation.

Read my post above. There really aren't many folks living in that place.

Including Brisbane? That's almost two million right there.

edited 13th Jan '11 5:51:12 AM by DarkDecapodian

This is scary... I have friends living in the Lockyear valley, mainly the nice old couples who drive me places and fellow uni students. I live there myself during termtime. I don't think any of them got hurt but I'm not sure.

Still, I take heart in the fact that our current levels of technology enable us to give so much more warning than we could in the past, and save more people.

Australia still has hamlets?

I've never called anything a hamlet. If you just mean 'very small town' then yes. I've passed signs that say "Welcome to Townsname! Population 56!"

edited 13th Jan '11 6:06:14 AM by LoniJay

Has this been posted in yack fest yet? If not, I call it.

Apparently the floods in Brazil, Sri Lanka, and Australia are linked by a global phenomenon called El Nino Southern Oscillation. Which is supposed to happen every 5 years, or something.

edited 13th Jan '11 3:09:44 PM by Shichibukai

We're getting floods in Victoria and Tasmania now, too.

(I'm from Queensland, and fine, by the way.)

I went into the CBD today - water's starting to recede, and the city absolutely *reeks*. My work was evacuated on Tuesday morning, and we're open again on Monday, if all goes well.

We were really lucky - I'm right next to a couple affected suburbs, but my area is really hilly - no damage, and we even kept our power on.

Went to see the edge of the river yesterday morning - it was moving so freaking fast.

I'll bet it stinks. Sewage, right? Or are there other awful, horrible things mixed in there?

Sewage, oil, debris, very likely dead animals - you name it, it's in it. And the Brisbane river isn't known for it's cleanliness in the first place.

Which was kind of funny - when I checked out the river yesterday, there were a couple of guys standing waist-deep in the water, taking photos. Not the safest thing to do considering how fast the water's been moving, and just plain gross.

Idiots. Don't they realise how dangerous that is?

Australia where everything EVERYTHING! is trying to kill you.

I hope they bounce back soon.

"Dur hurr we're teenagers we'll be fine hurr"

"Tragedy today, as three teenagers, found drowning in flood waters, died of diseases contracted from their time in the river."

Australia, land of droughts and flooding rains.

Damn straight, Dorothea Mackeller.

edited 14th Jan '11 12:26:23 AM by Drakyndra

One story that did make me laugh is that a bull shark was spotted in Goodna. Yep, a species of shark that is in the top 3 of 'most likely to attack humans' is just having a great time, swimming around suburban streets. Awesome.

Oh, and brown and red-bellied black snakes have been spotted in the water as well. So more reasons why it's a really, really, really bad idea to decide to go for that great photo that you want to put on facebook.

Australia: Where you go from one extreme to the other. No middle ground when it's comes to weather here.