Police search for owners of cars found in floodwaters after Cyclone Debbie – as it happened
This article is more than 7 years old
Australian authorities assess damage from the category-four cyclone that hit coast between Airlie Beach and Mackay on Tuesday. Follow all the updates here
We’ll be winding up this blog now but stay tuned to the Guardian homepage for updates.
The extent of the damage caused by ex-Cyclone Debbie is becoming clearer, but some places are still cut off from emergency services and communication. Debbie is now a tropical low heading towards central and south-east Queensland, and has brought dangerous flash floods.
Here’s what we know so far:
No one is thought to have died in the cyclone itself, and reports of serious injuries are still limited. That may change as emergency services reach cut-off areas.
Heavy rainfall, particularly around Mackay, continues to pose major flooding risks. Flash flooding is occurring, and emergency services have conducted several swift-water rescues after motorists became trapped in floodwaters.
Emergency services were working to rescue three people stuck on the roof of a submerged car in Sarina, and authorities were also searching for the owners and possible passengers of two vehicles found submerged in the Whitsunday region.
Debbie is now a tropical low, which is moving inland to central Queensland. It is expected to move to the south-east of the state in coming days.
Roads across the coast and adjacent inland areas are cut off, either by debris or road damage. Motorists are being urged to stay off the roads, to avoid danger and to free up space for emergency services and the army.
The state recovery coordinator, Brigadier Christopher Field, said a ship was being loaded with engineering equipment and humanitarian stores in Brisbane and would head to the Whitsundays this evening.
Hamilton, Hayman and Daydream islands were all isolated with no communication. Police have made it to Hamilton to assist the 4,000 or so people wanting to get out.
Sugar cane crops, crucial to the local economy, have been flattened, although growers are still assessing what has been permanently lost.
Yachts have been ripped from their moorings at Shute Harbour, near Airlie Beach, and structures in the area have sustained significant damage.
About 63,000 homes remain without power. It might be more than a week before some areas are restored.
Concerns have been raised about the cyclone’s impact on a stretch of the Great Barrier Reef about 100km long.
There have been some rescues from the tops of cars caught in floodwaters, the Queensland Fire and Emergency Services deputy commissioner Mark Roche has told the ABC.
Emergency crews work are now working to rescue three people stranded on the roof of another car submerged in floodwater on Rifle Range Road in Sarina, and a search is under way for the owners and possible passengers of two vehicles found submerged in the Whitsunday region.
“It astounds me when people continue to put themselves in this position,” Roche said. “We have to move our rescuers from impacted areas … You don’t need to be in your cars, you don’t need to be in those areas.”
He said if people are getting stuck because they were being reckless, or sightseeing, it could be described as “almost criminal”.
“I don’t know the details of whether they were sightseeing … but the reality is it’s impacting on our ability to do our normal role.”
SES personnel and response crews are working across Queensland to remove fallen trees, clear roads and restore power.
Queensland’s deputy premier, Jackie Trad, has told Channel Nine the tropical low will be hitting south-east Queensland in the next 24 to 48 hours.
She said island communities – Hamilton, Hayman and Daydream – were all isolated with no communication. Police have made it to Hamilton to assist the 4,000 or so people wanting to get out.
Trad has also urged people to take care as the high rainfall and flooding continues to have an impact on the region.
“If you don’t have to be on the road, don’t be on the road, and if it’s flooded forget it.”
Queensland police are searching for the owners and possible passengers of two vehicles found submerged in floodwaters in the cyclone-hit Whitsunday region.
At least one of the cars went under on the Bruce Highway near Proserpine and was found with its windows down on Wednesday.
The police commissioner, Ian Stewart, said officers were retracing the steps of those who owned the vehicles to find out if they were safe.
The Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, is on the ground in Bowen, where she just told media that roofs, fences, trees and power lines are down, but the SES is on the ground and people are already cleaning up.
“We’re going down to Proserpine next, where we expect there to be some more widespread damage,” she said. “It would have been horrific, and thankfully there has been no loss of life.”
Palaszczuk said she’ll be speaking to the prime minister about assisting affected farmers.
The state recovery coordinator, Brigadier Christopher Field, said a ship was being loaded with engineering equipment and humanitarian stores in Brisbane and would head to the Whitsundays this evening.
Annastacia Palaszczuk arrives at Bowen airport to inspect damage caused by Cyclone Debbie. Photograph: Sarah Motherwell/EPA
“It is still too soon to know just how severe the impacts of Severe Tropical Cyclone Debbie are – this will take some days, or even weeks,” says Richard Thornton, chief executive of the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre.
We cannot prevent cyclones such as Debbie, but what Australia can do as a country is improve our mitigation across all natural hazards. But what we do know is that the cost of the response, and importantly, recovery, will be high, and not just in monetary terms.
We need to focus on better building and rebuilding of homes, and ensuring that existing houses have simple and cost-effective mitigation measures.
A study after 2011’s severe tropical Cyclone Yasi showed that some roof upgrades to older houses could pay for themselves after just one cyclone. This is why a focus on retrofit options for existing homes is such a cost-effective approach to dealing with various hazards.
There is a critical need for discussion around land-use planning and land management, and how and where we develop new areas with roads, bridges and other infrastructure.”
Prof Barbara Norman, of the University of Canberra, has also called for preparation to mitigate the impact of weather events and climate change.
We have no national coastal strategy despite over 25 national inquires/reports recommending that we do.
We have no plan to minimise the impacts of extreme events and climate change on coastal communities despite a comprehensive parliamentary inquiry recommending that we do.
We now face billions of dollars of costs that will only continue to escalate in the future in the face of no action.
On Cyclone Debbie’s implications for the Great Barrier Reef, the coral scientist Terry Hughes has pointed out there is no silver lining.
There are concerns that a roughly 100km stretch of the reef will have been damaged in Debbie’s wake.
But some thought the cyclone chopping up seawater and cooling its surface temperatures might help mitigate a current mass bleaching event that has occurred for an unprecedented second year in a row.
Hughes told Guardian Australia “the cyclone is really immaterial” in terms of bleaching as “it comes far too late and in the wrong place”.
He has done seven flights over the stretch of the reef to map the extent of bleaching, with the last at its southern edge around Heron Island cancelled because of the weather.
“We’ve been seeing significant mortality of freshly bleached corals near Cairns over the past month,” he said.
“The reefs are as severely bleached as they’re going to get because the summer is passing, and the cyclone’s too far south to help them recover any faster.
“So we needed this cyclone much further north a month ago.”
Despite warnings from police and other authorities, there have been instances of looting, according to the Daily Mercury.
It reports a Whitsunday restaurant, Banjo’s, was unscathed by the cyclone but looters allegedly broke in and stole thousands of dollars worth of alcohol, cash and a safe. They also allegedly destroyed security cameras. The chef, Damien Rogers, said he had made the discovery about 6am this morning.
Bowen structures 'dodged a bullet' but environment damaged: councillor
Joshua Robertson
Detail has been scant about Collinsville, the inland mining town struck by its first category-two cyclone last night, given that the town has been cut off by floods and phone and power outages.
But Mike Brunker, the Whitsunday regional councillor who is originally from the town, said Debbie would have come as a shock and he had been told of widespread roof damage.
This included to the town’s “top pub”, the Central Hotel, which “had nobody in it but lost its roof” and the IGA supermarket, which had lost part of its roof.
“The houses are not built to [cyclone] standard. A lot of old houses. I think there’s a lot of roof damage,” Brunker told Guardian Australia. “Because all the phones are down, it’s a matter of just trying to keep in contact.”
Brunker, who tried to drive to Collinsville today but turned back because of the flooded road, said state emergency crews coming from the north would “probably shoot one straight out there”.
Bowen had perhaps dozens of houses that had lost their roofs.
“I can name about four that I’ve seen and that’s not getting around to have a look everywhere, so there will be dozens.”
But the worst fears about a wipeout of Bowen, whose housing stock includes a lot of places without cyclone rating, weren’t realised, Brunker said.
“As far structural damage goes, I think we dodged a bullet. But environmental damage as bad as anything we’ve ever seen.”
Brunker said he had seen army trucks in Bowen but there, as in Collinsville, it was now a case of “every man for himself until emergency services and so on get set up”.
Locals were flocking to the local supermarket to stock up on supplies again while others were getting out their chainsaws to start clearing the fallen trees that were everywhere.
“There’s people doing that because when you’ve got no power, you’re bored so you have to do something, you may as well be cleaning up your own yard.
“I just went in to the IGA and the crowd, I’ve never seen it so big.”
Damage seen in Bowen on Wednesday. Photograph: Sarah Motherwell/AAP
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