aussie floods/fires

Jespar

is anyone being affected by these natural disasters? its flooding here in northern nsw and i'm staying with my gran, we just moved everything off the lawn into the barn and i have a little canoe that im paddling around with a shovel!


post your stories

Tecton

While I'm not in Australia at the moment, this was taken in front of a friend's house last night:

Stay safe, Aussies!

Jespar

@tecton where abouts is this at?

Tecton

Gold Coast

Jespar

yeah thats pretty close to where i am its bloody windy here

Tvistor

So, leaving for Australia in two weeks.

I'M GODDAMN TERRIFIED. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE COUNTRY? IT SOUNDS LIKE GODDAMN EVERYTHING WANTS TO KILL YOU.

You know I went to a zoo there once and a guy was talking about TINY FORM OF SHELLFISH that hides in shallow pools. Then it GODDAMN STINGS YOU AND YOU DIE IN LIKE 10 MINUTES.

And then I found out that if you annoy koalas THEY WILL SERIOUSLY EFF YOU UP MAN. SERIOUSLY EFF. YOU. UP.

And then I was talking to this chick I know, and she freaks out and goes 'Omg there's a huntsman.' and I'm like 'What's a huntsman?' so she used her phone to take a picture.

OH GOD IT WAS THE LARGEST SPIDER I'VE EVER SEEN. I'M NOT EVEN GOING TO LAST LIKE FOUR WEEKS LET ALONE FOUR YEARS -- AND NOW THE WEATHER IS OUT TO GET ME TOO.

I ALMOST FORGOT TO MENTION GIANT SHARKS. And why are all your snakes SO VENOMOUS? 

Okay, I feel better now.

Melodie

10/10 rant, would read again.

Panpardus

It's a funny country Australia, Floods, Cyclones, Fire and Intense heat weather cycles all at the same time of the year and all in the same country.

Everything wants to kill you.

In saying that, despite the global financial crisis and all the other crap, we have been relatively untouched and with the strong dollar at the moment and the availability to now purchase most goods through the net it's even cheaper to get the luxury items.

(Not a bloody Mustang car though )

I wouldn't want to live anywhere else!

Tahquil

Afternoon all,

There's nothing that makes you want to go puddle jumping than being declared in a state of emergency. Unfortunately due to jumping into a puddle a little to deep I don't have any photos to share at the moment.

As an update on Queensland we've had many swift water rescues, 3 deaths so far. Bunderberg at the moment seems to be the hardest hit... and still waiting to the flood peak. They've so far had 4 mini tornadoes tear through it as well as major rises in water levels. As of this morning they've have 13 helicoptors working the area doing rooftop rescues with another 2 blackhawks flying down from Townsville/Cairns during the night. Brisbane harbour have had reports of waterspouts forming as well as 'light' flooding along the banks.

In my town all roads were cut, some of them opening one lane today due to massive potholes, washouts and other degradation.  We are pretty lucky we are on the coast and are such a hilly town the waters won't be here for long. The pub I work in is currently closed down as the roof collapsed due to waterlogging (noone was injured but one of the staff was a bare miss). I went with my dad today to check the boatramp he launches from, half of it is gone as well as the floating pier next to it. We did a count and there was 3 houseboats, 4 catamarans and 1 longline boat stranded up in mangroves, on the banks and on rocks. While we were there another houseboat broke from its mooring and two fishing tinnies raced to tie up and basically push/pull so it wouldn't smash on the rocks at the river mouth. They were barely able to save it.

Telephone infrastructure has been restored after 24 hours. In this 24 hours there was no telstra landlines, telstra mobile coverage and worse of all half of the Queensland coastline, some areas not even affected by the winds or water, weren't able to access 000 (our emergency number).

As a member of the SES driving about doing rescues today I only really have this to say.

It's flood water. DON'T BLOODY DRIVING THROUGH IT. DON'T ABUSE US BECAUSE YOU LOST YOUR CAR. BE THANKFUL WE CAME TO SAVE YOUR STUPID ASS.

Oceana

It is a sorry trend that ambulance workers, firemen and other rescue workers are being insulted and manhandled when they are trying to help.

Chryenth

Stress tend to make otherwise reasonable people lash out when they really wouldn't otherwise, I suppose.

Stay safe, folks.

Kyrra

My sister lives in Brisbane and I've still not heard from her. What I see on the news is so surreal at times, too.

I'm pretty thankful for people like Tahquil that are willing to risk their time, and in some cases, their lives, in order to help as many people as possible.

Exelethril

Sigh, here's to knowing I'm going to lose sleep worrying about Wysteria over the next few days  8-|

Jespar

hey @tvistor

look up while your down here ok?




BUT! if you manage to survive the snake killing spiders, jellyfish the size of a match head that will kill you in 40 seconds, the weather, oh and dont forget the man eating sharks, crocodiles and bears there is a consolation prize....

bikinis... bikinis as far as the eye can see

Tvistor

They tried to convince me drop bears were real, but I wasn't quite that stupid.

Chryenth

But, but... the bears, falling... bouncing bears, no worries...

Vadimuses

Lots of wood crap floating down the river, trees felled here and there but nothing major. My pool didn't even flood (it's right on the river) so I was pretty safe.

 Got to see some flooded bridges and roads on the Glastone area, here's a pic I snapped of one flooded place: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6yf1mjabawv81t5/20130128_150746.jpg

Veldrin

@Beatrice

She left for work 30 hours ago and I haven't heard from her since

Tahquil

@Vadimuses you're near Gladstone? That's Lake Awonga it its so scary I can't even make out where any of the boatramps are. Give me a week and a half and I'll be water skiing there.

Also current Gladstone update... Humidity : OVER 9000!!

Yilkon

@Veldrin I wouldn't worry about it too much, chances are she's just doesn't have any power (as of this morning there were around ~quarter of a million homes without power in Queensland).

Veldrin

I'm hoping that's all, but I can't stop this nagging that something might be worse off

Tahquil

One elderly male, one male motorcyclist, a small boy and one unknown (pretty sure male as well). Very very slim chance so feel better.

Possibility she's just stuck at work due to flood waters.

Tvistor

Everyone needs to take care of themselves so I can keep griefing them in game.

Wysteria

4 deaths in QLD. Out of power 48h and counting here. Laptop and wireless modem running on literally half a bar of signal.

Floods don't hit our suburb given we're higher up, however, we lost one tree but gained two new ones AND a chair from about 4 houses down. Pretty much all the shrubs here lean to the left as the gale force winds were that hard. Missing a few roof tiles and I'm not keen on that crack above my window and the still crackling sounds from the glass. Neighbour's 15m tall tree decided to tip over and smash right on top of their car and block their front door. Storm's gone now so it's just the heat wave to get through. Food wise, not having a fridge is something we're used to anyways and we have the gas camper stove to cook with (bbq galore in the neighbourhood).

Phonelines were down and we had no connection whatsoever over the weekend. Working in a call centre, the impact was harsh but not because of not getting calls, but people calling us en masse and acting like a switchboard to transfer to emergency services (and I work for a freight logistics company).

@Tvistor: I should take you out sometime and bury you in the backyard to show you around the sites to prove that not everything will kill you. Only when they feel like it.

@Aussies: Huzzah to state of emergency and tell your neighbours the following: "For crying out loud, TIE DOWN YOUR CRAP BECAUSE I DON'T WANT YOUR BACKYARD SETTING IN -MY- BACKYARD." Remember for the QLDers we're actually on a water restrictions just in case the clean water from the pipes get blocked from all the leaf litter over the Australia Day weekend.

Despite how annoyed I am at things right now, nothing can be more heart wrenching then seeing the slew of kookaburras, butcherbirds, magpies, lorikeets, noisy miners and figbirds still make the solid effort to come round to your backyard just to say hello…and ask for some food.

Bonko

Veldrin said:

@Beatrice

She left for work 30 hours ago and I haven't heard from her since

@Veldrin: I'm sure she's fine, don't worry. Pretty sure it flooded where she lives and the water knocked out the electricity/telecommunication lines. (For reference, we lost power for 24 hours and we're not really close to anywhere that flooded.)

Beatrice

Nice to be missed! We're all fine, it was quite impressive around my neighborhood. I'd add some pictures but I haven't figured out how to yet. Highfive to Telstra for getting power and telecommunications back up so quickly, and watching the idiots drive through flooded roads makes me want to perform a RL judgement.

Veldrin

Yay!

Trey

How many more people have to suffer before you people realize that God -hates- Australia.

Kyrra

I rather like living in Darwin. I only get griefed by spiders and the humidity.

Skye

hi guys. Finally got my net back. I keep myself it could have been worse. But then I got onto forums and saw all the unread messages ad I'm like

Darlah

I am really, really glad I moved out of Brisbane last year. Thoughts are with you guys going through this all yet again.