Dozens rescued from flooding
Emergency services chief say it is lucky nobody died after storm wreaks havoc across Queensland
Queensland’s emergency services chief says it’s “extraordinarily surprising” no one has been killed by Cyclone Debbie and its torrential aftermath, particularly due to the vast amount of flooding and power loss.
The deluge that hit the northern coastline with Category 4 Cyclone Debbie was wreaking havoc inland and also in the south of the state.
Almost 90 people — many stranded on the top of houses, cars and verandahs — were rescued by emergency workers yesterday morning after being trapped by floodwaters just west of cyclonebattered Mackay.
Queensland Fire and Emergency Services commissioner Katarina Carroll said there had been dozens of call-outs for rescue workers around Mackay in a hectic and tense period.
She was stunned there had been no loss of life or significant injuries, with floodwaters hitting the second storeys of many homes.
“Extraordinarily surprising, but you know, I think the community has been listening [to warnings],” she told the Nine Network.
“The difficulty with last night was you couldn’t see, it was dark, but also the conditions were horrendous, we couldn’t move.
“The communications, we didn’t have any. So it was very difficult to get a clear picture of conditions on the ground.
“In two storey houses there was water actually buffeting the second storey, so there was an extraordinary spike in the triple-0 calls.”
Overnight and morning flooding was at its worst southwest of Mackay where the Pioneer River broke its banks, overflowing local dams to exacerbate floodwaters, especially in the Eton and Homebush areas.
Forty-six people were rescued there overnight while another 40 more needed evacuating up until 10am local time yesterday.
“We did have people up on the top level of their houses, reports of people on the roofs of their houses and roofs of their cars,” Carroll said.
The Bureau of Meteorology con- firmed there was major flood warnings for a number of central Queensland towns, but said the Pioneer River in Mackay was “an easing situation” as the weather improved through the day.
Between 400-800mm of rain fell in Mackay in three days, forcing residents downstream of the Kinchant and Middle Creek Dams to move to higher ground.
Mayor Greg Williamson said yesterday that the city was also running out of safe drinking water with less than 24 hours of supply left.
Bowen, Proserpine and Airlie Beach — the towns hardest hit when Debbie ravaged the north Queensland coast on Tuesday — remained cut off, while tourists were stranded on resort islands.
About 58,000 homes and businesses were still without power in the area yesterday and the Ergon Energy team was prevented from restoring power by the flood waters.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten visited Bowen yesterday, making financial aid available immediately to the Whitsunday council to start rebuilding infrastructure.
“Nature flings its worst at Australians and it’s certainly happened here in the Whitsunday region, but it brings out the best [in people],” Turnbull told reporters.
Disaster assistance including concessional loans is starting to flow to primary producers after the cyclone tore up sugar cane and vegetable crops and hit the beef cattle industry.
However, recovery work in the north is being hampered by flooded roads, isolating the worst-hit northern towns.
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has described farming losses as huge, and has also warned of a major economic hit to the tourism sector, given the beating island resorts took.
The federal MP for the Mackay region, George Christensen, has called for authorities to prioritise cleaning up tourist areas.
Hundreds of tourists and residents stranded on Hamilton and Daydream islands were waiting to be flown to safety after winds reached terrifying speeds of more than 260km/h at the height of the cyclone.