Flooding in Queensland Australia.

[Adamant]

Bushfires in 2009 and now the worst flooding in our country's history, this video from yesterday describes conditions which have worsened today. The state of Queensland's capital Brisbane is literally overflowing, the death toll now is uncertain but at least 10 is confirmed with another 65 missing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjjCKqYftHs

Eye witness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Do0LvsdXIU

All extrapolations on global weather trends are useless at this point, La Nina combined with abnormal near-monsoonal rainfall has demonstrated the polar opposite to the hellfire of Victoria's infernos in 2009.
Any thoughts or theories??

[earthJoker]

I thought the great bush fires were two years ago. I was in Australia last year and it was a moderate summer for Australian climate (I almost felt like home).

[Adamant]

Apologies you're right, 2011 hasn't really sunk in mentally yet.

[GGT]

We had some posts in the messed up groove thread, or maybe it was the WTF thread? Some amazing and scary pictures of the flooding. I've been watching this for at least a week, but our only Aussie poster was termite. He was taking trips and having fun, until he posted about flooding messing with his business.

Rather hard to figure out what's going on Down Under. Drought, wildfires, floods.

Are you in Australia, Adamant?

[Adamant]

It's insanity, over $5 billion worth of damage, the central river system rising to over 22m (roughly 66ft) and simply making the lateral surge towards sea, the rain is relentless apparently and the videos speak for themselves.

Yes ma'am I am, living in between the evils of fire and flooding in New South Wales, this state remains relatively unscathed as far as natural wrath.
I've been fairly disenchanted by the lack of general empathy from citizens in my area, I'd thought my fellow Australians would do and feel more than simple awe at the spectacle. I guess little among us can truly visualise an enormous procession of water sweeping through the local township, carrying vehicles and in some cases entire buildings.
(This is/my identity was Widows btw)

[GGT]

Widows. *thinking* My memory sucks. Do you mean Widows of Oz?

No matter, the Australian flooding has sounded and looked quite horrible. Birds-eye pictures from google earth show vast swaths of land underwater. No idea how the farmers and vineyards are coping, news leaves the impression that it's dire but "salvageable". What's that mean? Sheep farmers have plenty of space to move the herd? Crops will be harvest-able when the water recedes? Pay no attention to the roads washed away or homes sunk?

[Adamant]

Widows Peak Oz I was, because because, wonderful things he does etc etc haha

We're dire realists down here GGT, first and foremost we recognise that not all is lost, but such a scale of disaster will leave its impact economically as well as physically. The inland deluge continues and true measures of life and property are uncertain, especially considering predictions of worse to come. Our media rarely sugercoats situations, ITC the ordeal began over 11 days ago, the reality of Brisbane (state capital) being seriously under threat could compromise conditions for hundreds of thousands. Our Summers usually accompany scorching beach weather, a few casual warm storms and months of typically Aussie sunshine, everyone is quite disturbed by recent trends though, this, for us, is not Summer at all.

[Dreadnaught]

The floods are sort of a "predictable" once-in-a-century event. I'm more concerned about how the draught down there makes the "Big Australia" policy workable. 'Cause I'm a prime candidate and may want to try it out someday.

[EyeKhan]

Well, if you say the weather's global warming related, you run into a pitfall of issues. It might be. It might sort of be. Its the kind of thing that ought to happen more frequently and more severely as a result of global warming. But could this have happened 200 years ago? Sure. Has it happened in Australia's not so distant (geologic) history? Almost certainly.

Recent hypotheses on winters under global warming is that the Northern hemisphere should have colder, snowier winters because the warmer oceans will put more moisture in the air, which will fall as more snow, and the increased snow coverage will reflect more sunlight and lead to more local cooling. But that's just hypothetical and it doesn't speak to the South. This might have something to do with changing wind patterns around Antarctica. I think I read something about that in the last few years but I can't recall the specifics. I thought it was about drought, not flooding . . . .

[Draco]

Well I live in Brisbane and it's been non-stop rain for the past few weeks. There have been floods for the past week or so in north Queensland, but it hit the southern parts this morning.

The town of Toowoomba (~130km west of Brisbane, population of ~130 000) was ravaged by a torrent of water and since this morning Brisbane's CBD and many inner city suburbs have been put on some 'high alert' status. As of this morning 8 were confirmed dead through out the state, amongst 4 of which were children sadly, and now I read 10 are dead, with some 77 missing. Parts of Brisbane's CBD are now confirmed to be flooded. The whole CBD and Fortitude Valley (an inner city suburb with many businesses) was evacuated this morning and according to the Lord Mayor, the worst is yet to come (apparently Thursday), with the river tides and all. There's a dam outside of the city, which has reached 200% capacity and they have no choice but to relieve it, so there'll be more water descending upon the city.

There are towns that are completely cut off road wise from the rest of the state, such as the town of Condamine, over 350km west of Brisbane. Keep in mind that many such towns through out regional Queensland were in a terrible drought not so long ago, now they need to be evacuated from all the water.

Some photo's:
Toowoomba






















It's dangerous to be driving during such floods, this was how a mother and her child were reported to have died:

[Draco]

Home made video of a street in the town

[Draco]

Bus stop










Poor animals too




Brisbane:
Inner city suburb of West End


CBD


+3 metres according to my observation of how it usually is

[Draco]

Hotel car park entrance






Opposite the CBD




CBD again




Part of the Riverside Express way






A town north of Rockhampton i think

[Lor]

Silly question, but how are you and your folks holding out?

[Draco]

Brisbane's CBD when it isn't flooded, just to give you an idea of how close the water front is to all the buildings and how bad it can be


Eagle Street Pier, flooded now


Compare to how it is now


And another perspective

[Draco]

Silly question, but how are you and your folks holding out?

Thanks for asking. I forgot to add that we're fine, since we live in the southern part of the city, some 16km from the CBD and don't live anywhere close to the river or anything of the kind. So there shouldn't be any flooding our way. But I was called into work earlier today (I work at a supermarket) and was told that they need extra staff really badly. When I got there, the whole store was packed with customers, everyone's worried that food will run short because of transportation issues and what. We had aisles of shelves literally empty.

And if anyone would like to donate, you can do so on the following site: http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.html

[Ominous Gamer]

You Aussies sound so funny but I am impressed by the balls on the SUV driver.

[Ominous Gamer]

Up until this picture I thought the flooding looked exciting, deadly but awesome.



Fuck everything about this. Growing up in Florida you learn that any and every body of water should be treated as if its gator territory (cause it usually is), but man having them wash in with the floods? Oh hell no.

[EyeKhan]

Cool. I occasionally see deer and bunnies.

[Draco]

^^lol that's cute.
But wow that crocidile picture is crazy! Do you know where it was taken Ominous Gamer?

If anyone's interested, there are heaps of photo's here of the Brisbane area http://www.igossip.com.au/?p=17996

[Draco]

Here are some other photo's http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/201...g.html#photo22
Some cute animals

Poor Wallaby though


A snake making its way across the Capricorn highway


Kangaroo


More Kangaroo's saved


And a Possum

[Ominous Gamer]

Stole it from reddit, this thread might say, but its about 300 comments long.

[Adamant]

That looks more like a contest to see who can post the most retarded thing about Australia.

Glad to hear you're surviving Draco, I have family in QLD too but thankfully they live in Noosa.
Btw, it's raining down here too, worst goddamn Summer ever.

[Draco]

^^It's actually a sunny day here in Brisbane with a few scattered clouds, it's weird. But it's been confirmed that a number of inner city suburbs, along with the CBD will continue to experience a rise in flood levels. My dad's work is starting to have water creeping in and they're trying to protect the place with sand bags but he says it's no use now.

I haven't heard anything about Noosa, so it must be safe.

Here are some pictures form the 1974 floods in Brisbane. They're predicting that this flood will be far worse.
CBD


CBD, this area is right next to the river


Suburb of Fairfield


CBD


CBD

[Supermarioman]

I haven't seen flooding that bad since Hurricane Katrina.

Looks almost apocalyptic in some of these pictures.

[earthJoker]

That really looks bad. At least the floods in Germany seem to go down again.

[Draco]

Well it's supposed to peak in Brisbane to around 5.2 metres right about now (1am here) and they're predicting that it'll stay that way for some 12-18 hours. Good thing is that we aren't expecting any more damn rain.

Suburb next to mine is slowly being flooded though, which is kinda worrying but if the weather holds true, then it shouldn't become any more serious. It's weird to be in a city with such a major flood, all I hear through out the day are helicopters and amublance sirens (I live next to a major road that leads into the city and through what are now flooded suburbs).

Some raw footage of the South Bank area, opposite the CBD, unbelievable!


Some other photos:
Suncorp Stadium in Milton (inner city suburb)


From above














Airport in the town of Rockhampton


Inner city suburb of St Lucia, right next to the river.


Suburb of Rocklea (20min drive from my place), you can see how far it's come by the 3.8m bridge mark

[Draco]

CBD


Inner city suburb of New Farm


Same suburb, different street


Suburb of Moorooka, just 10 minutes down the road from my place, damn. I heard that the suburbs north of mine were going under, but so long as it doesn't rain, I wouldn't expect it to rise my way.


Suburb of Milton again

[Ominous Gamer]

So this is the problem? Someone at McDs forgot to turn off the espresso machine?

[Draco]

^^haha

Well the floods are pretty much over now. The water reached its peak and it's now receding thankfully. It didn't get as bad as authorities said it would. But some 11 900 people have lost their homes whilst +12 000 have had some partial inundation along with businesses too. Now all we gotta do is wait for the water to clear out and volunteer to help out