In safest of hands
FORTY years ago the founding of the Cyclone Testing Station at James Cook University was completed following a painful birth of nearly 20 years.
Painful, due to the loss of life and devastation caused by cyclones which ravaged Northern Australia including our city of Townsville on Christmas Eve in 1971 with the arrival of Cyclone Althea.
Following the cyclone which hit Bowen in 1958 a “few good men” displayed courageous leadership over the next two decades and persisted with the forming of a cyclone testing unit at JCU.
Those gentlemen were Kevin Macks ( architect), Hugh Trollope ( Professor of Engineering at JCU) and John McIntyre ( consultant engineer).
In the ’ 60s and ’ 70s they pursued an agenda, determined for JCU and Townsville to become a leader in the study of cyclone resistant housing and other low rise buildings.
Cyclone Althea had demonstrated there was a fundamental problem with house construction in cyclone- prone areas of Northern Australia and yet bureaucracy was not listening to them or the building industry.
Progress was slow until the defining event on Christmas Day 1974 with Cyclone Tracy destroying 90 per cent of Darwin’s housing, causing the evacuation of 35,000 people.
Far worse than that, 66 people lost their lives in Australia’s greatest disaster.
Those “few good men” responded with a proposal to the Federal Government to establish a structural testing unit at the university.
It would be another three years before that proposal was formalised in 1977 with the commencement of operations.
As a result of this, building codes for cyclonic areas were upgraded to provide a safer community and a program of industry education evolved.
The Cyclone Testing Station is now seen as a world leader in the study of wind engineering with our team of research engineers travelling the globe to speak at conferences and share information with other countries. In fact, one of our engineers is in Florida now assisting with their storm investigation report.
As citizens of this city, we were all too aware of the massive event we dodged when Category 4 Cyclone Debbie decided to cross the coast at more southern latitudes. However, it has been 46 years since Cyclone Althea and in terms of destruction Cyclone Yasi resulted mainly in vegetation damage in Townsville.
When that Category 4 Cyclone does arrive and you and your family emerge safely from your home I would like you to pause for a minute and thank those “few good men” who, as founders of the Cyclone Testing Station, left us the most valuable legacy of all. JOHN GALLOWAY, Chair, Cyclone Testing Station.