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Cyclone Watch, North Queensland

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  • 27-01-2014 9:57pm
    #1
    The Sweeper
    Registered Users Posts: 10,658 ✭✭✭✭


    So there's a cyclone watch on at the moment in NQ. There's a low pressure system out in the Coral Sea that's showing signs of starting to spin, as it were. There's a greater than 50% chance of a cyclone forming on Wednesday or Thursday, and predictions are for it to hit anywhere between Cairns and MacKay.

    ...naturally, forecasting up here is like a black art so that may all change. Current weather forecast is for storms, but the overall guidance from the Oz Cyclone Chasers is for a cat 2 cyclone to make landfall either side of Townsville later this week, most probably Thursday.

    If you're in the North Queensland area and backpacking through, you need to check out the communal safe zones nominated by the local council. If you're in a property that's suitable for holing up, you need to enact your cyclone preparation (food and water for three days, cash and papers in a waterproof bag, fully charged phone so on).

    If you own or rent a place in this area, be aware that if you're uninsured you can take out insurance on your property and belongings now, before the cyclone is named. Once it's named nobody will cover you.

    Wherever you are in Queensland, be conscious that there's a LOT of rain coming in the next couple of weeks. Roads will be impassable. There may be flooding. Even if this system remains a tropical storm, there's potential for massive rainfall and Queensland hasn't had a good record of dealing well with that in the last few years.

    Don't drive through floodwaters. Especially don't swim in floodwaters. Be aware that if this makes landfall as a Cat 2 cyclone in or near your area, you may lose power and you may be without power for a few days. (So hopefully if you're backpacking you're somewhere that has a barbecue, so you can continue to cook for three days while you're waiting for civilisation to resume.)

    I'm prepped, am remaining at home (brick house outside flood zone) and have a pain in my face with the work ahead of me (moving all the untied crap in my yard into my garage and then getting my car in there too). Am also dreading potentially losing my fences.

    Biggest worry is that the highest tides of the season are due later on this week in Townsville. A king tide coupled with a cyclone storm surge could literally put quite a lot of this town underwater. (There's a reason a Queenslander is the name for a house on stilts...)

    Hopefully will come to nothing, but I wonder...


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