Debby downgraded after hitting coast
TOWNSVILLE, Australia — A powerful cyclone packing winds of up to 260 km/h roared across Australia’s tropical northeast on Tuesday, uprooting trees, tearing down fences and knocking out power to thousands, officials said.
Cyclone Debbie, which slammed into the coast of Queensland state as a fierce Category 4 storm, quickly began to weaken after making landfall near the resort town of Airlie Beach, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology said. By Tuesday night, it had been downgraded to a Category 2 storm, with wind gusting up to 155 km/h.
One man was injured after a wall collapsed in Proserpine, south of Airlie Beach, Queensland Police Commissioner Ian Stewart said. The man was taken to a hospital, where he was in stable condition.
The extent of the damage from the storm was not known as night fell across the region, but there were reports of roofs peeling from homes, fences crumbling and trees snapping in half. The idyllic Whitsunday Islands, a popular tourist destination, were hit particularly hard, with one recorded wind gust of 263 km/h, the meteorology bureau reported.
The slow-moving storm pounded the coastal region for hours, creating what Stewart called a “battering ram effect,” with the same areas enduring the howling winds and drenching rains for a punishingly long time.
Communities along more than 300 km of coastline were expected to be impacted, Stewart said.
Australia’s military was sending vehicles, aircraft and supplies to the region, with soldiers focusing on clearing debris and reopening roads, State Recovery Co-ordinator Brigadier Chris Field said.
John Collins, a member of the Whitsundays government council, was sheltering from the storm with his wife and four daughters inside their house in Proserpine. He could see that four of his neighbours’ sheds had been destroyed and every house within sight — including his own — had lost their fences.
“It sounds like you got a jumbo jet sitting on the roof of your house,” Collins said by telephone of the wind roaring outside. “It really is so loud. It’s incredible.”
Thousands of people evacuated low-lying areas in the storm’s path on Monday. Hundreds of schools were closed on Tuesday and more than 50,000 households were without power.