Flood information - links

[ozbob]

TROPICAL CYCLONE FORECAST TRACK MAP
Tropical Cyclone Anthony now Yasi

--> http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDQ65002.shtml

[ozbob]

Yasi is a big big low ...

==> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
30/01/2011

TRANSCRIPT - PRESS CONFERENCE - 11:10AM SUNDAY 30 JAN

Sunday, January 30, 2011

TRANSCRIPT - PRESS CONFERENCE - 11:10AM SUNDAY 30 JAN

E & O E - PROOF ONLY

TRANSCRIPT

JOINT PRESS CONFERENCE

11.10AM SUNDAY

30 JANUARY 2011

RE: CYCLONES; CYLONE LARRY APPEAL; FLOOD LEVY

PREMIER ANNA BLIGH: Queensland continues to face the prospect of two very significant weather events in the next five days. These are two quite different events and the weather Bureau's Jim Davidson is referring to them as potentially a David and a Goliath. That is we are expecting sub tropical cyclone Anthony to be the first event that we experience and for it to be potentially quite smaller than the second event. The cyclone warning as now been issued for tropical cyclone Anthony so the cyclone sirens will now be heard this event is likely to occur sometime between 10pm tonight and 4am tomorrow morning so we are expecting to see tropical cyclone Anthony make land fall overnight it could be as early as 8 o'clock tonight but more likely after 10pm and into the early hours of Monday morning.

Most likely place for landfall at this stage is into the Burdekin, potentially around the Ayr, Homehill area however there is anywhere 50km either side of that that needs to be on high alert. This is a system that is likely to bring with it rainfall of around 200 to 300 mm but could have 400 mm in parts and we do expect this to have, while it is the smaller event we should not for one minute underestimate it, this is a tropical cyclone that is expected to bring winds of 140km an hour.

Winds over 120 km an hour are regarded as destructive - so depending on where it makes landfall we do expect to see some damage out of tropical cyclone Anthony. We have issued the cyclone warning, all disaster groups in the vicinity are on full alert and evacuation centres are ready and able to take people post the event should they be needing shelter out of their own homes.

It is important to understand that a cyclone is different to a flood that rises slowly and isolates people. We are looking forward to evacuation centres that they would only be operationalised after the cyclone crossing the coast and only if necessary. The advice to everybody is to shelter at home and to take all reasonable precautions to keep your home safe. Take the outdoor furniture in, move anything that could become a missile, so people in the Burdekin area, around Townsville, Home Hill, Ayr, today is a time to batten down the hatches and make sure that you and your family are safe.

We are continuing to have very serious concerns about the second weather formation off the coast of Queensland. This formation is very large, it is likely to formally fall into a tropical cyclone today and it will probably be named today. A cyclone watch we expect will be issued tomorrow in relation to that event and at this stage the current modeling has brought forward by four hours the likely landfall time to Thursday morning. So we are looking at cyclone coming across the coast at this stage late tonight or early Monday morning and another potentially as early as Thursday morning. The second system is a very large system. It is a very large rainfall system as well as potentially a very significant cyclone so we are looking not only at potentially damaging cyclone but more very heavy rainfall which could fall into river catchments and cause further flooding beyond the cyclone. There is likely to be very significant gale force winds associated with the second event and I will ask Jim to say more about that in a moment. In relation to our preparedness for these two events. Yes we have come through a very difficult time and our emergency resources have certainly been tested in the last couple of weeks but however I want to reassure people that they have had ample opportunity to replenish themselves and restore supplies we are not battle weary we are battle ready and our highly trained people are well rested and they are ready to respond. We will continue to monitor these two events but there is no doubt that we are certainly facing a tropical cyclone overnight and we will be watching the second event with a great deal of concern and giving you updates when there is further information to hand.

As to preparations in the Townsville region. Abbott Point coal terminal has been closed. Hay Point has three boats just leaving this morning and it will then close, all Townsville Ferries to both Magnetic and Palm Island have ceased operation and the Sunlander train northbound this morning and southbound from Cairns have been cancelled this morning so all reasonable preparations for the main transport routes have also been taken.

JIM DAVIDSON: Thanks Premier and good morning everyone. I'm not too sure I can add much to what the Premier has said actually, she has covered both systems fairly well. Cyclone Anthony is a category one but we expect it to become a category two by 2pm this afternoon and once it becomes a category two it has destructive winds associated with it. The winds can be up to 140 km an hour and we expect those to impinge on the coast sometime after dark tonight, so anytime from 7 or 8pm onwards. The area between abound Ayr and Bowen could see those destructive winds. The extent of the gale force winds for Anthony is probably no more than 150 km. The difference between this system in the next one is such that the Gales associated with the second system the extent could be several hundred km, 3 or 400 km. Much larger system as the Premier said, More rain associated with it and it will bring with it also a storm tide threat. So we are watching of course Anthiony very closely bu t we have also got our eye on the second system because of the potential it has to cause real problems along the Queensland coast.

IAN STEWART: Today is the day for people in that Townsville and Burdekin area from Cardwell down to Proserpine to fine tune their preparations. To bring in those last necessities, those batteries we talked about, to make sure that anything that could turn into a missile is tied down. We shouldn't underestimate the power of any weather event such as tropical cyclone Anthony and I would ask to take this very seriously and to listen and monitor the radios and the media for the warns that will come over the next 24 hours. Thank you.

JOURNALIST: Mr Davidson, is the second one inevitable?

JIM DAVIDSON: Well I wouldn't say that was the case but the models have been absolutely consistent now for some days in generating a large tropical disturbance in Fiji's area of responsibility and moving it westward towards the Queensland coast. In fact consistent too has been the fact that the system has made landfall somewhere along the central Queensland coast on Thursday of this coming week so I guess we have a lot more credibility in what the models are telling us when they models run consistently from one to the next so it is not inevitable but there is a good likelihood that we will see a fairly large system on the Queensland coast by Thursday.

JOURNALIST: Can I ask how often do you get that level of consistency across all the models?

JIM DAVIDSON: As time goes on the models are becoming more sophisticated, they are getting better enabling us to put more credibility into them. It is unusual to have a forecast this far out. The models were picking this up four or five days ago and we are still four or five days from landfall so we are looking at a nine or ten days forecast which is quite incredible really considering so it doesn't happen very often and I guess that is why we are taking this seriously. The very fact that all the major models have been predicting this for some days makes us feel that the potential is quite good.

JOURNALIST: how does it compare to previous cyclones in terms of (inaudible)

JIM DAVIDSON: It is not some much the intensity and maybe I should stress that. At the moment what we see is a very large system. There is a weak correspondence between the size and the intensity but it is not a very strong one, so it could still come ashore, if it does come ashore, as a category two and yet have a large area of impact. That is gales and rain over quite a large area but it is just too far out to make a call on what the intensity might be on landfall.

JOURNALIST: inaudible

JIM DAVIDSON: Okay the second system we put out an alert to all communities between about Cooktown and Hervey Bay so being so far from the Queensland coast and quite a few days ahead we are playing it safe I guess and it is possible that anywhere between those towns could see part or all of this new system.

JOURNALIST: Premier what did you think when you first saw the image behind you - it is quite frightening

PREMIER: Well one the one hand these models help us to get ready and be prepared but on the other they certainly let us know what we might be in for and this is a very disturbing weather pattern. The satellite map, we are taking it very, very seriously and making sure that we are as prepared as you can reasonably be for something of this size.

JOURNALIST: What are you doing in relation to things like caravan parks to make sure that they are more secure?

PRE MIER: In Townsville shelters have been opened predominantly for people who are either homeless or who are in circumstances such as caravan parks. But people who have a home are much safer in their own home and we would encourage people to shelter in place. Every location that might be facing this possibility does have evacuation centres identified they will activate them when they exactly where it has formed and what the implications are. There are people in Townsville staying in shelters now but these are people who are homeless and you don't want people living in the parks when something like this hits or who are in very temporary accommodation such as caravan parks.

JOURNALIST: You say we are battle ready, not battle weary. Is there a precedent for Emergency Services dealing with two systems this size coming ashore in such a short period of time.

PREMIER: I might ask Jim to answer that in terms of the history of it but certainly not in my living memory.

JIM DAVIDSON: I think the last time this happened was several years ago in 2006 when Cyclone Larry crossed the coast we had another cyclone following just three days or so behind it and very fortunately for Queensland the second cyclone dipped southwards across the Tasman Sea. But at the time the models were telling us that the cyclone would dip down to the Tasman Sea and not impact Queensland. The difference this time around is that the models are telling us that the new system will continue to move west towards the Queensland coast.

JOURNALIST: if infrastructure is damaged by this would you see that money perhaps from the flood levy being used to pay for that?

PREMIER: Clearly we don't know what is likely to be the outcome of these two events we will do what we can do and that is prepare for them first, then respond to them and make sure that we can keep as many people safe as possible and then look at the recovery and see what, its implications are and how we will fund it. I think it is just a bit early to be looking at that when we don't even know what will occur.

JOURNALIST: Is there some money left over from the Cyclone Larry appeal?

PREMIER: Let me deal with Cyclone Larry Appeal. There are what I regard to be very irresponsible reports this morning.

Firstly every single dollar that was donated to the Cyclone Larry appeal has gone to a victim of Cyclone Larry. Remember there were some 21.8 million dollars donated. There was some interest accrued because it was in a bank account and you expect some interest to accrue. Some of this was then spent on helping some community organisations such as the rebuilding of a CWA hall, there are some funds remaining out of that interest, some $700,000. That money cannot be transferred until all claims have been settle and there is one outstanding claim that is the subject of a dispute between the owner of the home and the builder and we have a contingency for that outcome and when that is settled we will look to relocate those funds.

Can I say a couple of things? One, every single eligible claim in the cyclone Larry fund was paid and every single dollar that was donated was paid to a victim of cyclone Larry. There are some remaining interest funds which even after the fund paid every single victim, they still had some money, so what they did was go and rebuild some of the community facilities that had been damaged including the CWA hall and if my memory is correct a bowls club. After that there was some remaining interest in the funds and as a report that was main public in August last year outlined any remaining funds would be reallocated to future disaster appeals and that is what is going to happen but it can't transfer until all legal claims against it are finalised and that is yet to happen.

JOURNALIST: John Paul Langbroek says you are sitting on it. Are you sitting on it?

PREMIER: Any suggestion that there is money sitting idle that could be helping people is utterly without foundation and is an irresponsible and false claim. We have thousands of Queenslanders right now who are in pain, who are hurting, who need the appeal funds and who need people to have confidence in donating. Stories this morning about money sitting idle after cyclone Larry is completely and utterly wrong and I am very, very distressed to see anybody put any sort of doubt in people's minds about donating to these sorts of appeals.

JOURNALIST: inaudible.to transfer is outside of your control.

PREMIER: That's right you cannot wind up the trust fund legally until all claims against it are finalised. That we expect to happen within a couple of weeks but let's be clear these things take years. The people who have had their lives torn apart cannot be expected, and I don't expect them to be able to make the best decision for themselves and their families immediately in every case and we learnt that in cyclone Larry. People needed time to decide whether they were going to rebuild in Innisfail or whether they were going to move and we will give people that time if they need it. The last claims against Cyclone Larry were finalised in December last year. That's how long it took for some people so the $700000 that is accruing interest, that cannot be transferred at this point because of that building dispute, is accruing interest, it is not idle, it is making money that will then be used for victims of this terrible flood event.

JOURNALIST: has this happened before, where you have had donations that have rolled over into other funds.

PREMIER: Look I don't know I am happy to have a look for you. Ultimately what happened in cyclone Larry was that people were very touched by the circumstances they saw in Innisfail and we ended up with slightly more money that we need to repair people's lives and get them back on their feet and that money was interest not donations and what will that money go to? It will go to current flood victims and they will need every cent.

JOURNALIST: Are you worried.(Inaudible)

PREMIER: I would say to anybody, particularly those who might be going to make a donation at the cricket today or any other event that is being held around Australia. Our Government has a strong track record of making sure that every person who has an eligible claim gets paid and that is what we are going to do. Don't let irresponsible media reports undermine your confidence and your generosity. People here in Queensland still need your help. I was in the Lockyer valley yesterday and I can tell you that there are people there whose lives will take years to get back on track. Money will make a big difference but we are going to have to continue to look after people for a long time so please don't let your confidence in this be undermined by what I regard as seriously irresponsible media reports.

JOURNALIST: inaudible

PREMIER: The appeal is around the $186 million mark and I am very pleased that cricket Australia today will be making a very big effort through the one day match at the Gabba to build on that base. I certainly want to see these numbers climb, we have got a number of these events that will generate more funds and we need them. This event has affected thousands of people it is of a magnitude way beyond Cyclone Larry and way beyond anything that any state of Australia has had to deal with in terms of the number of houses and the number of lives that have been affected so we still need your help Australia, we thank you for your generosity to date but Queensland still needs your help.

JOURNALIST: What would you say to Tony Abbott and any other federal MPs who might be thinking about voting against the flood Levy?

PREMIER: It is just impossible for any, one level of Government to overcome the scale and dimension of this disaster. We need the federal government to fund their share and if they need to do a small levy for a brief period of time then we should back them, frankly, I am very disappointed that Tony Abbott doesn't think that Queenslanders are worth making this contribution because I think Queenslanders are worth ever cent and I think it is important to every Australian than Queensland gets back on their feet as quickly as they can.

JOURNALIST: inaudible

PREMIER: Look I am not here to comment on the Federal budget. My view is that we need ever level of government all working together and frankly this is a time when I would have thought some bipartisan support at every level of government would have helped us get through this disaster.

JOURNALIST: Would you like to see a disaster relief fund, Queensland wide (inaudible)

PREMIER: We will have a look at what we learn out of this disaster. I would have thought something like that frank;y would be better done on a national basis and I understand there is some discussion about it but right now we don't have one of those so we have got to do what with what we have got and what we have got is an appeal fund that we thank the generosity of Australian's for. That appeal fund will go to help do the absolute basics. Get a bed for their son or daughter. Get a washing machine, replace some of the absolute basics of life. What the commonwealth funds, the state funds and local government funds do is rebuild roads, rebuild bridges, rebuild railways. The rest of Australia if they want to see reasonable prices for their beef, their fruit their vegetables that come out of Queensland we need those export chains rebuilt and operating as quickly as we can.


JOURNALIST: (inaudible)

PREMIERS: I would want to see what it cost and what the benefits would be before I make a final view on it but it's hard to look at a disaster of this scale and see the people who are devastated from news from their insurance companies that they may not be covered after thinking for 30 years that they were and not reach the conclusion that a country like Australia couldn't do it better in the future.

JOURNALIST: (Inaudible)

PREMIER: AS we contemplate what might lie ahead I think it would be easy to think that somebody up there has got a grudge against us but frankly this is just what the weather in a tropical state does from time to time and we have to be ready to cope with it. What we have seen in thelast few weeks is an emergency service response that I think is world class and is one that people can have confidence in and rely on in the week ahead.

==============================================================

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
30/01/2011

TOWNSVILLE, MACKAY DISTRICTS DISASTER DECLARED AHEAD OF TC ANTHONY

The Townsville and Mackay disaster districts have this afternoon been preemptively declared disaster areas ahead of Tropical Cyclone Anthony's expected arrival overnight, Premier Anna Bligh said.

"The declaration of a disaster situation gives our police and emergency personnel authority to evacuate members of the public as necessary to ensure the preservation of life and property," the Premier said.

"Tropical Cyclone Anthony is expected to cross the North Queensland coast tonight as a category two system, bringing destructive winds and heavy rain.

"Local and state-level disaster management personnel are working to ensure the preparedness and safety of the community.

"Declaring these districts as disaster zones ensure these personnel have every power they need to minimise the loss of life and property."

Premier Bligh said it was important those living along the coast between Cardwell and Sarina and adjacent inland areas kept up-to-date with the latest developments on the cyclone and took heed of warnings from police and other emergency services agencies.

"Already this storm season 35 Queenslanders have lost their lives. We do not want to see any additions to that toll from Tropical Cyclone Anthony."

==============================================================

[Golliwog]

Bowen Radar (BOM) You can see the swirl of rain from the cyclone here. The rain doesn't appear to be too heavy (as far as the radar is showing anyway), but the wind is the main thing. If you click the weather observations checkbox on the right hand side you can get wind speeds from some places. 9pm at Hamilton Island airport the wind was 70km/hr, 48km/hr at Proserpine.

[justanotheruser]

One of the key bungles was the government leglislating to use Wivenhoe dam as a water supply dam rather than the flood mitigation dam that it was designed to be.
The original design for Wivenhoe was that entering into the summer wet season the dam was to be at a maximum 40% capacity level, Somerset was the water supply.
As a consequence of the directions of the Bligh government to the water supply authority Wivenhoe was at 107% capacity when it should have been at 40% or lower, this 60%+ of capacity would have meant a flood level of some 3m or more lower which would have saved billions in flood damage and a number of lives.
If that is not a bungle of monumental stupidity bordering on criminal negligence what is? ask some of those whose houses and businesses had water through them that had the flood levels been that 3m lower would not have occoured for their opinion.  

Thanks for your reply but it is not relevant.  Unless of course you can prove against all available evidence presented so far that Anna Bligh's comment was made in the context of rebuilding.  If it was in relation to everything then you would have a point but as it was in context of rebuilding your argument means nothing.

I don't need to ask people what difference 3m would have made. I have first hand experience.

[ozbob]

From the Courier Mail click here!

Government will consider sacrificing Wivenhoe Dam drinking water as flood prevention measure

Government will consider sacrificing Wivenhoe Dam drinking water as flood prevention measure

   * Brian Williams
   * From: The Courier-Mail
   * January 31, 2011 12:00AM

THE State Government may this week take the radical step of releasing some of Wivenhoe Dam's drinking water as a temporary flood prevention measure for Brisbane.

ith two cyclones bearing down on the coast, Natural Resources Minister Stephen Robertson sought a report on the proposal from Seqwater a week ago and will meet dam managers this morning.

Mr Robertson said he wanted to know how effective lowering the drinking water supply level for the remainder of the wet season would be.

"It is important to note that substantial reductions in the water level at Wivenhoe dam can be achieved within a matter of days," Mr Robertson said.

"While the Bureau of Meteorology has advised that it is very unlikely either cyclone will cross the coast south of Hervey Bay, we must be ready to respond if the situation changes."

Any releases would give dam managers more room to reduce potential flooding in Brisbane but could have a long-term detrimental effects on drinking water storages in an area that traditionally has more drought than floods.

Rain was so heavy in the 7020sq km Wivenhoe Dam catchment before Brisbane's floods three weeks ago, that at one point Wivenhoe was rising up to 5 per cent an hour.

The dam had never held such large amounts of water since being built in 1984 and had never operated under such extremes.

After every flood event, operating instructions are reviewed.

Wivenhoe has the capacity for 1,165,238 ML of drinking water when full but also has a 1,450,000 ML flood compartment which is currently empty.

Dam managers, who have been under pressure over releases during the Brisbane floods, juggle flood compartment releases based on a range of issues, including the amount of water in Somerset upstream, the extent of rain, unregulated floods downstream of the wall, tides and the need to protect various communities.

Lord Mayor Campbell Newman said the management of Wivenhoe Dam and any water releases should be carried out in accordance with the operations manual.

If any changes were contemplated, it was a matter for state authorities working with Weather Bureau advice.

If heavy rainfall from a cyclone did occur, localised creek flooding could impact on many residents who were not affected by Brisbane River flooding three weeks ago.

"I would encourage residents to inform themselves of what impact creek flooding can have on their properties so they can minimise the risk of possible damage," Cr Newman said.

"Free flood maps and reports can be downloaded from council's website and show what impact different flood events may have on an individual property.

Residents should also register for the Brisbane Early Warning Alert Service that provides flood alerts via SMS, email and home phone.

About 40,000 people have registered since the service began in December 2009, about half in the past month.

Peter Faust, Hinze, Wivenhoe and Somerset are the only dams in Queensland designed and operated as flood mitigation as well as storage facilities.

[ozbob]

From the Brisbanetimes click here!

First cyclone hits Queensland, but the big one is still building

First cyclone hits Queensland, but the big one is still building
Tom Reilly
January 31, 2011

THE upper reaches of Queensland's central coast were hit by a cyclone last night which battered some areas with winds of up to 140km/h.

The category two cyclone, named Anthony, made landfall near Bowen, 120 kilometres south-east of Townsville, at about 11pm and brought torrential rain to the state.

Rivers and streams stretching over more than 400 kilometres were on flood warning and areas between Bowen and Mackay were hit with more than

It was unclear last night how much damage Anthony may have caused, but there may be worse to come: forecasters are predicting that a second, more powerful cyclone, called Yasi, will hit the state on Thursday.

The Queensland Premier, Anna Bligh, admitted it "would be easy to think somebody up there has got a grudge against us," as she warned Queenslanders yesterday to prepare for the powerful weather systems.

Ms Bligh described the two weather systems as "David and Goliath". Anthony was expected to be "quite smaller than the second event" which could cause winds well in excess of 200km/h.

"All disaster groups in the vicinity are on full alert and evacuation centres are ready and able to take people [after] the event, should they be needing shelter out of their own homes," Ms Blight said.

She also sought to reassure people that emergency workers, some of whom have been battling floods since November, would be ready to deal with the aftermath of the cyclones.

"They have had ample opportunity to replenish themselves and restore supplies. We are not battle weary, we are battle ready," Ms Bligh said.

The Bureau of Meteorology's Queensland regional director, Jim Davidson, said it was unusual to get an accurate forecast on Yasi so far in advance, but all of the modelling predicted a large "disturbance."

[ozbob]

Looking grim ...  --> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

TC Yasi

[ozbob]

From the Brisbanetimes click here!

Wednesday's cyclone to be 'a state event'

Wednesday's cyclone to be 'a state event'
January 31, 2011 - 9:51AM

North Queensland has endured the destructive winds of Cyclone Anthony, but the weather bureau is warning a bigger cyclone that's likely to affect a much larger area of the state is on the way.

Cyclone Yasi is just north of Vanuatu, about 2000 kilometres east-northeast of Bowen, which suffered only minor damage when Anthony crossed the coast on Sunday night.

Unlike Anthony, which weakened into a low pressure system after crossing land, Yasi is expected to menace Queensland as a strong cyclone even after crossing the coast.

Queensland's Bureau of Meteorology says it's likely to cross the north coast either on Wednesday night or Thursday morning.

The bureau's senior forecaster Gordon Banks said Yasi would be big and intense, bringing destructive winds and heavy rain across the state.

He said like January's devastating floods, Yasi will most likely be a state event.

"It's going to affect a much larger area [than Anthony] both with rainfall and wind and because of its size and strength, it's likely to persist as a cyclone even after it crosses land," Mr Banks told ABC Radio.

"I think eventually Yasi will be a whole state event."

AAP

[Fares_Fair]

Looking grim ...  --> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

TC Yasi

Wow, that is a huge and ominous cyclone looking at the images in the link provided.
Thanks Ozbob.
I hope it fizzles out big time.

Regards,
Fares_Fair.

[colinw]

Wow! 

To give an idea of how big a cyclone can get, check this out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Tip

[shiftyphil]

Check the comments - people still opposing the dumping of additional water.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/government-will-consider-sacrificing-wivenhoe-dam-drinking-water-as-flood-prevention-measure/story-e6freon6-1225997137868

[ozbob]

All tropical cyclones are a little unpredictable.  A cyclone the size of Yasi is a major concern.  It could come in anywhere, although at this time Central Queensland to Northern is more likely.  Just stop for a minute though, and imagine what would happen if this came through on the coast at Brisbane/Gold Coast.  Gold Coast would have very serious major flooding issues apart from wind damage.  The huge rainfall would swamp all river catchments (more rain generated as it lifts up over the coastal ranges as well), I doubt if an empty Wivenhoe would hold the water. Brisbane would have more flooding as would Ipswich more than likely.  

The contrast yesterday between TC Anthony and TC Yasi on the the infra red view http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html was very dramatic to say the least.

TC Yasi could weaken (unlikely), could reverse course (unlikely).  Most probable scenario is steady intensification and progression due west.  

I would note all warnings and prepare accordingly.  Even in Brisbane.

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
31/01/2011

Prepare NOW for Tropical Cyclone Yasi

Premier Anna Bligh has tonight urged all residents of the area between Innisfail and Mackay to make immediate preparations as Tropical Cyclone Yasi continues its path toward the Queensland coast.

Ms Bligh said the extremely serious weather event now looked likely to cross the coast overnight on Wednesday and all residents should now be taking precautions, including stocking up on essential items.

"Latest advice from the Bureau of Meteorology is that this cyclone will be accompanied by significant flood in low lying areas from storm surge," Ms Bligh said.

"Those residents in low lying and waterfront areas in the Innisfail to Mackay region should be making arrangements to relocate on Tuesday.

"Advice from the Weather Bureau is that coastal areas in Yasi's path will begin to experience wind gusts beyond 100km an hour early on Wednesday.

"So I implore all of those people who feel they may be facing a dangerous situation to leave their homes in plenty of time and relocate to friends and family.

"If you have family or friends on higher ground, go to them.

"I understand leaving your home will cause anxiety but I would rather people were inconvenienced for a couple of days than place themselves in dangerous situations.

"If you want further information about whether your house is in a storm surge area, check the maps on the website of your local council or contact the council.

"Our government and our State Disaster Management Group is in close and constant contact with those councils in the areas that may be affected and your council is ready and able to provide up to date information.

"I urge all residents of these coastal communities to treat this cyclone as extremely serious - we are facing a difficult time and I want everyone to remain as safe as possible."

==============================================================

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
31/01/2011

TRANSCRIPT - PRESS CONFERENCE - 3:00PM MONDAY 31 JAN

E & O E - PROOF ONLY

TRANSCRIPT

PRESS CONFERENCE

31 JANUARY 2011

RE: CYCLONE YASI

PREMIER ANNA BLIGH: I've been briefed by the Bureau of Meteorology this afternoon, and senior officers of our emergency response team. I can confirm that tropical cyclone Yasi has now entered Australia's cyclone watch area, and a cyclone watch has been issued this afternoon, and we expect to be moving into full cyclone warnings around lunch time tomorrow. The cyclone watch has been issued for the area from Cairns to Yeppoon. All local disaster management groups in that area have been activated and as a precaution we are, in fact, preparing in areas as far north as Cook Town, and as far south as Maryborough. All of the models, I'm advised, all of the models of this cyclone are consistent. They all say that we are facing a very large system and that that system is intensifying. It is expected, currently forecast to be a category four cyclone off the coast by Wednesday morning. It's heading on all models, directly west into the Queensland Coast, and as I said, currentl y predicted to be a category four off the coast by mid morning Wednesday. It's expected at this stage to make landfall, or to cross the coast, anywhere from late Wednesday evening to early Thursday morning, so sometime overnight on Wednesday this week. The most likely place that it will cross, according to current models is the area between Innisfail and Mackay. We are taking precautions as I said from as far north as Cook Town, to as far south as Maryborough, but particularly the region that we are focusing on the most is the area between Innisfail and Mackay. We expect to see gales in that Innisfail to Mackay region of more than a hundred kilometres an hour, by mid morning on Wednesday. That means that we need to be making as many preparations as possible in that region in the next thirty six hours. To that end some nursing homes will begin as a precaution, making evacuations in that region this afternoon. We are encouraging people in that region to take this very seriousl y and to make sure that you are stocking up and preparing yourselves, your homes and your family for a very significant event. We've also been doing significant work today on the possibility or the likelihood that this event will be accompanied by a significant storm surge that will cause flooding on coastal areas in that region. Mayors have for some time done very comprehensive mapping, councils in that area, to identify what might be at risk if there is a storm surge, the bureau's modelling toady indicates that this is an event likely to be accompanied by a significant storm surge. So in addition to the effects of a cyclone, we are preparing in that Innisfail to Mackay region now for potential flooding of low-lying, waterfront areas. I'll be on a phone hook-up later this afternoon with the Mayors in that area. But the best advice that we can give to people in low-lying, waterfront areas between Innisfail and Mackay is that they start to give consideration to possible reloc ations sometime on Tuesday. If people have friends that they can relocate with, they need to start talking to them and making plans for themselves and their families. On a few other things, the Whitsunday Island, Hamilton Island, has started a partial evacuation of guests on the Island, other Whitsunday Islands are currently considering their evacuations plans and likely to begin that process tomorrow. All ports from Cairns to Mackay will be closed by late tomorrow afternoon. This is a very serious threat. We have to take this very seriously, and we are preparing for it. In addition to a very significant cyclone, possibly one of the largest we have ever seen in Queensland, we expect to see this event become a significant rainfall event in areas to the south and surrounding where it crosses the coast. That means we can expect very significant rainfall, in some cases, up to a metre into catchments that are already very saturated. We are currently doing modelling on what that m ight mean, particularly into areas such as the central and western areas of Queensland. This is such a large system, the bureau does not expect that it will dissipate quickly when it crosses as you've seen Anthony do today. But, for that rainfall to continue very significantly into those catchments, which as you know, we've already seen very significant flooding in. So we are doing everything we can to prepare in the couple of days that we have. We have deployed resources across the likely affected areas; swift water rescue teams have been deployed into the major areas, as have other rescue teams and additional police are being deployed into this region today. This is an event that we have to take seriously. I know as many other Queenslanders do that cyclones can at the last minute, turn off the coast and I certainly hope that that's what this one does. But the bureau advises me in the most serious terms that all of the modelling, all of the modelling right now says this is going to cross our coast, likely sometime in the next two to three days and it may well be one of the largest and most significant cyclones that we've ever had to deal with. The most likely area that it will fall in to, as I said, Innisfail to Mackay. These are very highly populated areas, so we will need to take every precaution and make every preparation and that is what we are doing. And we're encouraging residents to do exactly the same. Do you have anything you wanted to add?

DEPUTY

COMMISSIONER IAN STEWART: Thank you Premier. As has been our practice and as has been our underlining principle for the last six weeks, personal safety is the key to this event. We ask people to take whatever action it is necessary to protect themselves and their loved ones. Relocation should be considered by the people who are in low lying areas. This is a very, very, very serious threat to the safety of our coastline and the safety of our community. Certainly, there are a range of preparatory things that people can do, they are the same as for Anthony, that is to ensure that people are stocked up with necessities, making sure that batteries, torches, water, foods stuff, those types of necessities are in the home, ready to be used. People need to be self sufficient, or be in the position to be self sufficient for a couple of days, following and during this very, very, serious event, thank you.

JOURNALIST: When would you expect to, or would you expect to have to force people to evacuate at any stage, Premier?

PREMIER: That's not currently on our agenda but I have, overnight last night, declared the Townsville and Mackay regions disaster regions for the purpose of ensuring that police have the powers they need, if they believe, in the interests of public safety, that relocations need to happen. At this stage, we are encouraging people to prepare for this event. We will be able to give much more precise information tomorrow after the next round of modelling on the cyclone, once it gets a bit closer to the coast, and when we've overlayed that information with the information councils have about the likely impact of a storm surge.

JOURNALIST: Is this a case of 'go early, and go hard' and get that message out?

PREMIER: This is a very serious threat. I can't underestimate the possible threat to people who live in this region but it's equally important to make sure that we're taking every possible preparation. Look, I hope that we're wrong. I hope this cyclone turns around. I hope that on Thursday and Friday we're all breathing a big sigh of relief. But I would rather that people and their families were inconvenienced for two or three days by moving out of home, than finding themselves in a potentially life-threatening situation on Thursday because they didn't take the right precautions. So we're certainly looking at, not only a significant cyclone, we are looking at a cyclone that will be associated with a storm surge on coastal areas, which could bring significant flooding with it. And then we are looking at that rainfall incident moving inland into the central and western regions that could bring further flooding immediately after the cyclone. So the next week is shaping up as one that will require a lot of work from our emergency people, and I just ask people, just as we've seen in the last four weeks, please cooperate with the warnings, please cooperate with police and emergency workers. We're doing our best to keep you safe.

JOURNALIST: What is the bureau saying about the rainfall and how far south is it likely to come?

PREMIER: Because of the way that cyclones rotate, they will see more rainfall and more wind to the south of wherever it crosses. So obviously it depends on exactly where it crosses but we will expect to see rainfall anywhere within 100km, about two to three hundred kilometres south of wherever it hits. So we do expect. that's why we're preparing for potential flash-flooding and other events - not cyclonic, but nevertheless have to be managed - as far south as Maryborough.

JOURNALIST: Have you been given any assurances by, from the weather bureau that we won't see significant rain in the south east, given the flooding that's happened down here in the last three weeks?

PREMIER: Certainly the current advice from the bureau on the current forecasting of this cyclone is that we wouldn't expect to see significant rainfall as a result of it into the southeast. But of course, this cyclone could end up coming further south and we'll know that better tomorrow and the day after. Though on current forecasting, that's the case.

JOURNALIST: Given the strong winds for Wednesday, would you consider shutting schools or hospitals or other public infrastructure?

PREMIER: We will have a much better idea tomorrow depending on where this cyclone, how it tracks overnight, where it is likely to make a land crossing, and where we're likely to see gale-force winds. When we have that information we will be. every school in the region has a phone tree, and every preparation is being made to advise parents as quickly as possible about when schools will be shut. Of course, unlike the most recent events, we are now back in school time and we will be making every necessary preparation to make sure parents know what's happening with their child's school.

JOURNALIST: Are you advising people not to travel into that zone?

DEPUTY

COMMISSIONER: Premier, yes we are. Obviously we'd ask that people defer travel into the primary zone and certainly into any of north Queensland at the moment. I think that it would be a very, very sensible concept in terms of trying to protect all of our people. In particular, we're concerned about tourists who aren't used to the conditions in this state and we would ask that the tourist industry give good advice to tourists who may be considering that type of travel.

JOURNALIST: And at this stage, people who aren't in low-lying areas, should they be thinking of staying in their homes with provisions, or moving into evacuation centres?

DEPUTY

COMMISSIONER: No, certainly with cyclones shelter in place in the primary underlying principle. Um with the housing that's been built of, in the modern era, ever since we've had a series of cyclone events in the '60's and '70's, building codes are such that housing in those areas are built specifically to withstand the rigours of cyclonic winds. They are much better sheltering in place.

PREMIER: The only reason we're advising people in low-lying areas to consider possible relocation is because of what may be significant flooding associated with the storm surge, rather than the winds of the cyclone, if you like.

JOURNALIST: Rainfall in the catchments, is that the catchments of the Dawson or Fitzroy, is it around that sort of area?

PREMIER: Potentially. On the current tracking, this cyclone is scheduled to hold its formation for some time and to deliver significant rainfall. As is said, the bureau is indicating it could be as high as a metre in some places and the Central Highlands, and then further into the western districts are the most likely at risk at this stage, and as we know those catchments are already very full. So, there are a number of aspects of this event yet to play out.

JOURNALIST: So places like Emerald and Condamine that are already flooded or have just been flooded, they could go again?

PREMIER: We couldn't rule out further flooding in areas that have already experienced significant flooding in the last four weeks, if this cyclone behaves in the way that it's currently predicted to do.

JOURNALIST: Should SEQWater be releasing some water supplies from Wivenhoe, drinking water supplies from Wivenhoe?

PREMIER: At this stage there is no indication that we can expect this sort of rainfall into the southeast, but that's something that will be monitored every day.

JOURNALIST: Mining companies want special dispensation for a general release of their discharge water. Would you consider that in such an emergency situation?

PREMIER: There are a number of mining companies who I know are impatient to get back and be fully operational and we want them operational as soon as we can because they're big employers. But we also want them to do that in a way that is environmentally responsible. We will not be giving a blanket permit for every mine to de-water their pits. We need to test that water, we need to make sure of its, issues like it's salinity and its contamination. And we will not be giving a blanket permit for mines to empty highly-salinated, potentially contaminated water into drinking waterways and to waterways that go onto the Great Barrier Reef. What we are doing is working with every single mining company individually. Many of them have already been tested and released but we will not be giving blanket excuses, or permits if you like, to these mining companies. They will be tested and monitored before they can release any of this water. So I understand they're impatience but we' re going to put environmental responsibility at an equally high level.

JOURNALIST: When should the next briefing for the Disaster Management Group be from the weather bureau?

PREMIER: The State Disaster Management group will meet at 5 o'clock this afternoon, when there will be some renewed modelling available for the group and I'll certainly make that available, if there is any further advice at that time.

JOURNALIST: And then the weather bureau will brief that meeting?

PREMIER: Yes. At 5 o'clock

==============================================================

[ozbob]

Courier Mail --> Exodus as Cyclone Yasi bears down

[ozbob]

TC Yasi  IR Radar --> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

Is it swinging slightly west nor west?  Hope so ...

[colinw]

Current forecast has it crossing between Cairns & Innisfail. 
http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDQ65002.shtml

[ozbob]

Slowly going further north.  If it stayed on its present track (no guarantee of course) will impact Cooktown or further north ..

--> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

[colinw]

North of Cooktown would be good.  Not good for the sparse population up there of course, but far better than Townsville or Cairns, or (God forbid!) Innisfail again.

[ozbob]

North of Cooktown would be good.  Not good for the sparse population up there of course, but far better than Townsville or Cairns, or (God forbid!) Innisfail again.

Less direct property damage north of Cooktown although serious rain/flooding/surges for a few hundreds km further south.

The BOM thinks it will start to track west south west before too much longer.  This is one time I do hope they are wrong and the TC lifts up further north, stays on the west nor west path.

[ozbob]

I think TC Yasi has started to shift slightly west south west ...

Cairns right in line ..

===========

From the Brisbanetimes click here!

Thousands face evacuation as severe cyclone bears down
Daniel Hurst
February 1, 2011

Thousands of north Queensland residents could be forced to leave their homes later today as authorities prepare for the arrival of severe Tropical Cyclone Yasi.

Authorities are also planning to evacuate two Cairns hospitals, with patients facing the prospect of being moved to Brisbane by Hercules aircraft.

State disaster co-ordinator Ian Stewart said mandatory evacuations could be carried out today along the coastline from Mossman near Port Douglas down to Cardwell.

Mr Stewart said low-lying areas could be at risk from storm surge triggered by Cyclone Yasi, expected be an upper level category-four system when it crosses the coast late tomorrow night.

This stretch of coastline includes Cairns, with fears that low-lying areas will be swamped by storm surge associated with the cyclone.

"It's about a quarter of a million [people living] in the total area, but obviously not all of them live at the front in the storm-surge areas," Mr Stewart said, urging people not to be complacent.

Ms Bligh said it was a "highly volatile situation" so plans would continue to be revised as the forecasting models were updated with more precision.

She said more details would be available at lunchtime, but thousands of residents could be asked to leave their homes.

"We are talking about thousands of people in these at-risk areas of storm surge," she said.

Townsville Mayor Les Tyrell said the council had ordered the evacuation of retirement villages in low-lying areas in the city and urged other residents to seek higher ground on their own accord.

"They should move today. We don't want people out on the road evacuating tomorrow morning," he told ABC Radio.

Ms Bligh said gale force winds could be felt along the north Queensland coast from as early as 8am tomorrow, and residents in the danger zone had a narrow window to prepare.

The Cairns Base Hospital, located on the esplanade, currently had 300 in-patients and could be at risk from the storm surge.

"We are now looking seriously at an evacuation of Cairns Base Hospital," Ms Bligh said.

Ms Bligh said patients were expected to be taken by ambulance to the airport and would then be carried by Australian Defence Force Hercules aircraft to Brisbane, in what was shaping up as a "very big exercise".

"Some patients may be able to return home earlier than they planned, others may need to be evacuated," she said.

Ms Bligh said Cairns Private Hospital, which had 60 patients, may also need to be evacuated.

There was capacity in Brisbane hospitals to look after the patients, but some elective surgery may need to be cancelled, Ms Bligh said.

Ms Bligh said tourists and residents wanting to leave the region by air only had today to do so, with air travel into areas north of Townsville affected by tomorrow morning.

"I know people are getting advice that airlines are full but major airlines will be putting on extra flights into the region today," she said.

"So if you are wanting to leave the region by air today is the last day to do that most likely."

Jetstar has said it is putting on extra flights to get travellers off Whitsunday resort islands.

Schools in the affected regions will be closed on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

Police urged anyone who was relocating or being evacuated from the path of Cyclone Yasi to register their details with authorities.

The Cyclone Yasi Evacuation Registration and Evacuation Enquiry Line number is 1300 993 191.

International enquiries can be made to +61 7 3055 6220.

A police statement said people travelling in north Queensland should also register so friends and family could check and reassure themselves they were safe.

This would allow emergency services to concentrate on looking for individuals who may be missing as opposed to simply out of contact, police said.

People can also register their details online at www.redcross.org.au.

- with AAP

[ozbob]

Yes, TC Yasi definitely has turned, now west south west ..

--> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

[colinw]

BOM is currently projecting a direct hit on Cairns.  This is not good.

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
01/02/2011

TRANSCRIPT - PRESS CONFERENCE - 9:30AM TUESDAY 1 FEB

E & O E - PROOF ONLY

TRANSCRIPT

PRESS CONFERENCE

1 FEBRUARY 2011

RE: CYCLONE YASI

PREMIER ANNA BLIGH: There has been some changes with Cyclone Yasi overnight. Cyclone Yasi overnight has got faster. It has gone further north and it is intensifying. It has now speeded up to a system travelling at approximately 40km an hour. What this means is that the most likely crossing time is at 1am on Thursday morning. It has moved north and the high risk area is now between Cairns and Innisfail and the cyclone warning area has extended as far north as Cooktown. We expect to see gale force and destructive winds from the Mossman to Ayr-Home Hill area.

I should say in relation to predictions at this stage, sometime tomorrow morning, the Bureau of Meteorology has a radar station on Willis Island, which is east of Cairns. The cyclone is expected to cross Willis Island sometime tomorrow morning. The staff who are located on Willis Island have a Category 5 cyclone shelter, but it will come onto their radar system at that point. At that point, we will be likely to have a crossing point down to about a 50km degree of accuracy and precision.

This cyclone has also intensified overnight. It is now most likely to cross the coast at an upper level Category 4. By comparison, Cyclone Larry was a mid level Category 4. So we are expecting to see winds of more than 250km an hour, and these are winds of higher intensity than Cyclone Larry. This of course is not only a system now tracking as more intense than Cyclone Larry, it is significantly larger than Cyclone Larry. So the areas on the north and south of the crossing point will likely to experience significant weather disruptions.

This system is so big that even at low tide 100km south of the centre we would expect to see some tidal storm surge activity. If there is any silver lining here, the movement of the cyclone slightly north has meant that when it travels west and goes inland, it is less likely to drop all of that massive rainfall into the Central Queensland catchment areas that have already experienced flooding and more likely, no guarantees, but more likely to head into the gulf and take the rain into areas more able to cope with it.

This system is such a large system that the eye of this cyclone, that is the period that people in the immediate area will experience as a period of calm could last for more than an hour, and it's very important that people understand that calm is not an opportunity to go walking outside and to have a look around. This is such a big system that they eye could last for more than an hour and at the end of that period the next thing that will be felt is the strongest possible winds. So those people who are in the eye of this storm, we're getting this message out early so that people know not to get out and about.

Cyclone warnings will start today at 11 o'clock. As I said it will extend from Cooktown in the north down into the southern areas around Ayr and Home Hill. But those people who are not in the critical area between Cairns and Innisfail need to prepare for significant and difficult weather as well. It's likely that those on the Atherton Tablelands will experience weather conditions of around a Category 3 cyclone. Townsville can expect wind and other weather conditions of around a Category 2 cyclone and Mackay and Whitsundays can expect Category 1 conditions, that is, heavy rainfall, very rough weather, high seas and strong winds. So we will expect to see very difficult and potentially dangerous weather a long way down the coast out of the danger zone.

This system will be accompanied by significant storm surge activity that could or is likely to lead to very high amounts of water coming into flash flooding in the areas that are affected. If this cyclone does hit as currently predicted around 1am, that thankfully will be low tide. However, if it accelerates or slows down, it could come back into the high tide range. So the storm surge warnings for low lying and waterfront areas remain, and people on either side of the Cairns and Innisfail areas should still be taking every precaution and considering relocation.

As you can see, there has been some changes overnight and we can expect that there might be some further changes in the next 24 to 36 hours. That means that we are making decisions and giving advice in a highly volatile situation. What we do know is that we can expect to see devastating and destructive winds in this region as early as tomorrow morning. That means that travel after about 8am tomorrow, travel anywhere north of Townsville is going to be extremely difficult. We would anticipate that airports are likely to close tomorrow and we would expect that major roads are likely to be either shut or have very limited access on them and that the driving conditions will be very, very extreme.

So really what that means, today is the time to act. Today is the last opportunity for people to safely prepare for this event. Preparation means firstly if you are in a low lying or waterfront area in the danger zone and beyond, you need to relocate yourself and your family. Local disaster management groups are meeting in each of these areas this morning and a number of them will take a decision to move to mandatory relocations and evacuations. If you have an emergency service officer or a police officer knock on your door and ask you and your family to move, I ask you to cooperate with them. What we've seen in the last five weeks is that where communities cooperated with authorities, we were able to protect lives. Where communities got enough warning to prepare, we could keep them safe. We do have time to prepare but that time is now and it is today.

For those who are not in those waterfront low lying areas but in the affected zone, you need to take action to protect your property, that is, to lock away your vehicles, to put away outdoor garden furniture and to lock away anything that could become a missile in cyclonic winds. Anyone from Mackay to Cooktown needs to prepare to be self-sufficient for a period of time. The size and extremity of this storm will take down powerlines, will take out electricity substations. You need to prepare for a period of time without electricity. That means getting batteries for torches and radios. It means stocking up on food and fuel and it means making sure you've got candles and other equipment that will see you and your family through a period without electricity. We can't say how long that might be, but we do know in some places it could be for an extended period of time.

There are people who in this region who are trying to leave the region today, particularly people who are tourists or visitors to the region, and I know that people are getting advice that airlines are full. Can I say that the major airlines Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin will be putting on extra flights into the region today. So can I encourage people if you are wanting to leave by air, today is the last opportunity to do that most likely, and you should contact airlines and let them know that you want to be on one of the flights that they will bring in today.

In relation particularly now that the cyclone has moved north and the very strong likelihood of tidal, sorry, of storm surge, floodwaters, we are now looking very seriously at an evacuation of Cairns Base Hospital. Cairns Base Hospital is on the Esplanade and will be susceptible to storm surge. There are approximately 300 patients who are currently in-patients and who may need to be completely evacuated to Brisbane. And there is a further 60 patients at the Cairns Private Hospital that's similarly located. Work is now occurring with the Australian Defence Force to do a massive evacuation potentially out of the Cairns Hospital later today.

JOURNALIST: When will that decision be made, Premier?

PREMIER: That will be made in the next couple of hours when we have refined the storm surge advice from the Bureau of Meteorology and the Department of Environment and Resource Management experts.

Finally, can I just say that all schools, Catholic, independent and state schools in the Far North Queensland district will be closed for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week. Letters will be going out with children going home from school today and I advise parents that all schools in the Catholic education, independent and state sectors in the Far North Queensland region, that extends down to south of Townsville, will be closed. For a further 62 schools in the North Queensland region will be closed on Wednesday, depending on where this cyclone hits, but on current advice, that's where we would expect to see most schools in this region closed. All schools close Wednesday and most closed Thursday and Friday as well.

Ladies and gentlemen, this storm is huge and it is life threatening. Being well prepared is our best defence. I know many of us will feel that Queensland has already borne about as much as we can bear when it comes to disasters and storms, but more is being asked of us and I am confident that we are able to rise to this next challenge. We have redeployed considerable staff and we will do more today. Swift water rescue teams, emergency staff and extra police are already in place and more will be deployed into the Cooktown and Cairns regions today.

We will have every available resource on site and in place in the event that this cyclone as currently predicted crosses our coast in the next 48 hours or so.

Ian, did you want to add to that?

DEPUTY COMMISIONER IAN STEWART: Thank you Premier. Can I just reiterate, please make no mistake. This storm is a deadly event. People need to take action between now and tomorrow morning, after which time in the high impact areas it will be unsafe to travel. So do not make any mistake, do not be undecided. Take action now either to prepare yourself to shelter in place, if you are out of the storm surge areas, and that information is available through local government, either on their websites or by telephone. But if you are in those storm surge zones, you must relocate voluntarily, or as the Premier rightly said later on today there will probably, most probably be mandatory evacuation orders made and that is likely by lunch time today. So now is the time to act, prepare yourself, relocate out of the high risk zones if that is at all possible. That is the best information that we can give you at this time.

Thank you.

PREMIER: I should add on that point that I have the Minister for Emergency Services and myself have this morning signed a pre-emptive disaster declarations for all local government areas in the Central Queensland, Northern Queensland, Far Northern Queensland and Western areas to ensure that police and emergency workers required to do a mandatory evacuation will have all legal powers to do so. But as we've seen over the last five weeks, I would hope they do not use to use those powers. We will only get through this with cooperation and working together and I'm confident that the people of Northern and Far Northern Queensland will be safer if they can do that.

JOURNALIST: Will the defence force be assisting with any other evacuations apart from Cairns Hospital?

PREMIER: At this stage we're not in need of any Defence Force assets for other evacuations, but that will be monitored on a regular basis. We do have senior representatives of the ADF on the State Disaster Management Group and on the local group in Townsville and they stand ready to deploy and we're most likely to need their assistance after this event has crossed the coast.

JOURNALIST: Where will the patients be taken to?

PREMIER: They will be accommodated here in Brisbane. Some elective surgery may need to be cancelled to accommodate those patients, but across the southeast we have spare capacity in hospitals and that is being managed as I speak. So it's a very big exercise. Some patients, and that's the health, the hospital workers in Cairns are now working. Some patients may be able to return home maybe a day earlier than they planned, others will need to be relocated.

JOURNALIST: Did you say how many there is?

PREMIER: There are between 250 and 300 patients who may need evacuation. It's in a range because we're now working with every single patient, some who are able to go home may prefer to do so and may well be safer in doing so. So that exercise is occurring right now. The Cairns Base Hospital is on the Esplanade. It is very likely to be subject to significant storm surge activity if the cyclone hits on its current forecast pattern. We don't want to be undertaking this exercise tomorrow in destructive gale force winds, so we'll be looking at it today.

JOURNALIST: How will they be transported to Brisbane, the patients, is there..

PREMIER: They will be taken with a combination obviously of ambulances to the airport in Cairns and transported by a Hercules by the ADF is the current plan.

JOURNALIST: Premier, where is that going to leave Cairns' ability to deal with medical emergencies once the cyclone hits.

PREMIER: Thank you, good question. There are other health facilities in Cairns that are not in the tidal storm surge zone which will be equipped to deal with medical emergencies. So there will be another facility in Cairns and they're just working through which one it will be. That is out of the immediate storm surge area that will be equipped to deal with medical emergencies. Cairns staff and doctors and nurses will be staying in Cairns to manage those emergencies.

JOURNALIST: So where is that? Where should people go in.

PREMIER: We'll be able to advise you. They have a number of health facilities and they're just currently working out which one is best. But there are a couple of options and they may in fact end up with two or three on the northern and southern sides of Cairns. So that will be advised to people in Cairns throughout the day should the evacuation occur.

JOURNALIST: Does the evacuation message still extend to people south of Townsville, that far south?

PREMIER: Yes, we do expect to see, as I said, in Townsville Category 2 cyclonic conditions and in Mackay Category 1. We are unlikely to see the storm surge that we were worried about in places like Mackay if the cyclone hits at low tide. But that is still a very big if. It accelerated overnight and if it accelerated again overnight tonight, that could move it into a high tide range.

So I understand that people want absolute accuracy. Unfortunately in these events there is a level of volatility and some people may relocate and ultimately it's unnecessary. I would rather you were inconvenienced for three days than have your lives threatened by dangerous, fast-rising, powerful storm surge waters. So the message to people in those areas is still if you're in a low lying area, if you're on the waterfront and you can relocate, it is the safest and best thing to do.

JOURNALIST: Ian, you spoke of mandatory evacuations at lunch time today. Where will they be happening?

STEWART: Certainly in the high impact areas and that will obviously in the Cairns area and south. One of the challenges that we have with this is the moving nature of where landfall may be. And again, that's why we haven't specified that because we need everyone to be prepared. On the southern side of landfall, we will expect significant storm surge and again this is going to be impacted by the timing because of the tides. So mandatory evacuation orders will probably be put in place for all areas from. certainly Mossman, probably all the way down to at least Cardwell.

JOURNALIST: So how many people potentially is that involving?

STEWART: It's about a quarter of a million in that total area, but obviously not all of them live on the front in those storm surge areas. But the mapping provides people with an indication whether their residence is located in that, and people need to go online or to ring their local council to find out if they're in a high-risk area.

PREMIER: But we are talking about thousands of people in those at-risk areas of storm surge if we see this come into the Cairns region.

JOURNALIST: There won't be mandatory evacuations in Townsville or Ayr or Mackay?

STEWART: It is possible. Whilst I mention Cardwell, the timing of this and the, as the information becomes clearer as we get nearer to landfall, which is still expected to be in the early, in the early hours of Thursday morning or late on Wednesday evening, as that becomes narrower and narrower, we will have a much better idea where that is. So we may put mandatory orders in place so that we can act right up to the last possible moment to ask people to get out. Now, that is likely to be before 8 to 10am tomorrow morning.

JOURNALIST: When's the next update from the Weather Bureau?

PREMIER: There will be further information and modelling on storm surge activity around 11 o'clock today provided to councils and so that will be available and information about mandatory evacuations around lunch time or just after lunch time. The Weather Bureau will update all of its models again in time for the five o'clock State Disaster Management Group meeting. In terms of tracking these sorts of changes, there needs to be a bit of time in between the models to get an indication of movement.

JOURNALIST: Premier, are you anticipating doing another one of these briefings (inaudible)

PREMIER: Look, I think it would be useful. I'm conscious that we may have more information in relation to mandatory movement by then, and I'll probably have confirmation on Cairns Base Hospital and the other emergency medical treatment facilities in Cairns. So it is, as I said, a changing volatile situation. We're trying to give people the information they need. We can't give people with the same sort of precision that you can with a slowly moving rising river in a flood, and people will just have to accept that this volatile information or this volatile situation, we give you as much information so that you can make the best decision for you and your family.

Okay. Thanks.

STEWART: Thank you.

==============================================================

[ozbob]

E & O E - PROOF ONLY

TRANSCRIPT

PRESS CONFERENCE

1 FEBRUARY 2011

1:00PM

RE: UPDATE ON CYCLONE YASI; CAIRNS HOSPITAL EVACUATIONS

PREMIER ANNA BLIGH: We are still planning for a very significant cyclone event to hit the coast around the Cairns-Innisfail region. That means that the councils in Cairns, the Cassowary Coast, Hinchinbrook and Townsville are all in the process of relocating residents in the high-risk area, in waterfront and low lying areas. At this stage, there hasn't had to be any mandatory evacuations, but we will continue to advise you throughout the afternoon.

As I advised this morning, there's been quite a lot of work done this morning on the Cairns Base Hospital. A decision has been made to fully evacuate the Cairns Base Hospital and the Cairns Private Hospital. Approximately 205 patients will be evacuated from Cairns Base Hospital and 50 from the private hospital. The Air Force have confirmed that they have sufficient aircraft to undertake the task and evacuations will therefore commence in the early evening. The Air Force aircraft have to be fully fitted out this afternoon and then transported to Cairns.

All Brisbane hospitals have been put on what's known as a 'code brown alert'. This requires those hospitals to make sufficient arrangements to accept incoming patients. They will do this wherever appropriate by cancelling elective surgery where possible and by early discharges where they can. I'll invite the Chief Health Officer to make some further comments, but I'm advised that across all of the hospitals in the Brisbane and southeast area, these patients can be easily accommodated and there is an officer in charge at the receiving end of ensuring that patients are efficiently allocated this evening when they arrive in Brisbane. This is a very big exercise and we're checking the records but we're not sure that we've ever totally evacuated a big regional hospital like this in Queensland's history. As I said, I'll invite the Chief Health Officer to make some comments about that further.

Additional flights have been going into the region and there will be further attempts to get further flights in there this afternoon. For example Jetstar I know has had two extra flights into Cairns, Qantas has had two extra flights into Cairns and is attempting to get a third flight in this afternoon. However, we could, depending on the weather conditions see some airports close as early as this evening. So all efforts are being made to provide additional flights in this afternoon.

We are also endeavouring throughout the afternoon to put in place arrangements for those people who do need to relocate but who are unable to do so with friends, family or workmates and we will have provided further advice about that mid-afternoon when we have all of the details settled.

I'll invite the Deputy Commissioner if he wants to make any further comments, and then the Chief Health Officer to add in relation to the hospital.

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER IAN STEWART: Premier, only that we're very, very pleased that a large number of people have determined to self-evacuate out of the danger areas by driving out and taking their families with them. We ask that people don't panic-buy in terms of petrol. There are good supplies of fuel in the Cairns and south of Cairns areas. But this raises another issue, and that is of road safety. Please I'm asking you, those people who are self-evacuating, who are leaving by travelling south out of that area, certainly we would like you to be very patient and very careful. The last thing we need is precious resources being utilised in dealing with road squabbles or certainly snarls on our roads, and we have large numbers of traffic police out assisting the volume of traffic to move south and to the west. Thank you.

PREMIER: Jeannette?

CHIEF HEALTH OFFICER JEANNETTE YOUNG: Thank you, Premier. Given the information that Health has been provided that there is a real risk that the hospital in Cairns will be inundated with water, we made the decision to err on the side of caution and evacuate all patients from that hospital and the private hospital. We're doing it purely because we think that is the best for those patients given they're amongst vulnerable in the community at the time. And we know we can do that safely with the assistance of ADF and we know we have the capacity in Brisbane to take those patients. So I'm confident that that is the right thing to do by those patients.

PREMIER: Questions?

JOURNALIST: Chief Health Officer, can you just explain the condition that the patients are in that will be transferred?

YOUNG: They'll be all of the patients in the hospitals, so those will range from intensive care patients through to mothers expecting to give birth, through to dialysis patients, coronary care patients, neo-natal patients, some premature babies, children. This is the entire hospital.

JOURNALIST: So it's fair to say some of these people will be quite sick?

YOUNG: Yes, but we do this every single day in Queensland. We've got a very big state and we move very sick patients around the state all the time. So I'm very confident.

JOURNALIST: But not in these large numbers, I suggest?

YOUNG: No, but that's where we have the capacity with ADF to do so and we'll be putting our doctors and nurses on those planes to move these patients safely.

JOURNALIST: What time will those flights arrive this evening Dr Young, do you expect?

YOUNG: Late evening.

JOURNALIST: After ten, eleven?

YOUNG: At the moment that's still being worked through logistically.

JOURNALIST: And there'll be a fleet of ambulances here to transport them, is that.

YOUNG: There will be. We'll have a staging post managed at the airport so we can manage the numbers that are coming in and then distribute them out to the hospitals in Brisbane.

JOURNALIST: How many ambulances are on standby for that?

YOUNG: QAS has got all that in hand.

JOURNALIST: How many patients can be transported in each sort of Hercules aircraft?

YOUNG: That's been worked through with ADF at the moment.

JOURNALIST: Premier, is Cairns still the big danger area?

PREMIER: Currently modelling certainly has Cairns as the largest centre likely to be affected by the crossing of this cyclone. But still down south of Cairns, wherever this crosses, the area south of it will be hardest hit, so we're still very concerned into the Cassowary Coast area, which is cities or towns like Innisfail, Mission Beach, Cardwell, further into Hinchinbrook and into Townsville.

JOURNALIST: Premier, what about some of the preparations for Palm Island and also remote indigenous communities?

PREMIER: The mayors of Palm Island, Wujal Wujal and Hopevale have been part of the State Disaster Management hook-up and Palm Island has all of the storm surge modelling on the island and has put in place arrangements to ensure that people affected by storm surge can be located into other homes on the island. Similarly, Wujal Wujal and Hopevale and of course Yarrabah east of Cairns are all looking right now at the storm surge data and determining what, if any, relocations may need to occur. Yarrabah of course is particularly low lying and their council is working with the Cairns Council and the Bureau exactly where they need to relocate people to.

JOURNALIST: Has the cyclone crossed any small islands or any land mass at all?

PREMIER: Not to my knowledge, no. I think the first thing that we will see in our area, the cyclone cross tomorrow will be the Bureau of Meteorology radar station on Willis Island where there are four bureau staff who will be gathered in the one cyclone Category 5-proof building I would suggest.

JOURNALIST: Have there been any forced evacuations at this stage?

PREMIER: No.

JOURNALIST: And do we know how many evacuations there have been?

PREMIER: No, we have set up a phone line for people to register if they're evacuating and we'll provide some more information about that this afternoon. But obviously people are doing this informally. They're going to their mother's place, they're, you know, staying with friends. So, no, it's not possible to track exactly how many but we would be encouraging people later today once they have relocated to register and to let police know because their friends and loved ones from around Australia will want to know where they are and we don't want them to be inadvertently listed as missing.

JOURNALIST: What is the traffic like out of there now? Is there problems on the road already?

STEWART: My understanding is that there isn't, but the volumes are growing and we are encouraging people to make this decision early. If they're going to go, now is the time to do it, and we're grateful that people are taking what we consider quite sensible action in this regard.

JOURNALIST: You said this morning that you'd make a decision or a decision will be made by lunch time today with regard to mandatory evacuation. What's happening with that?

STEWART: Certainly. Mandatory evacuation can only be undertaken with the full support of the local councils and they're meeting as we talk. In fact, I'm hoping to leave here and go and speak to the relevant officers and Mayors straight after this meeting. So certainly we will have a better idea by the next time we provide you information this afternoon.

JOURNALIST: How far will the community have to travel by car south to be out of the danger zone?

STEWART: Well, certainly Townsville is going to experience on current modelling the equivalent of a low Category 2 cyclone all the way down to about Home Hill and we're advised that Mackay will experience similar conditions to a Category 1 which is similar to what was involved with Tropical Cyclone Anthony just the other day. So in reality we would like people to get as far south as possible, you know, quickly as possible without of course breaking the rules. But Mackay is probably a target area for the safe, for complete safety.

JOURNALIST: Premier, have you worked out the alternative medical arrangements to Cairns yet?

PREMIER: Ah, no. I'll invite Jeannette. There is a couple of facilities being looked at, but there is certainly ample emergency staff to provide emergency medical treatment and that will be available and we'll be in a position to give more precise information I would hope later this afternoon.

Did you have anything to add to that?

YOUNG: That's quite right, Premier. Our concern is that the Cairns Base Hospital may well be inundated so people can't access it. So we will set up an alternative emergency department elsewhere where we know it won't flood.

JOURNALIST: What hospitals are the patients being taken to in the southeast?

YOUNG: At the moment we have Princess Alexandra, Royal Brisbane and Women's, the Children's Hospital all on standby and QEII.

JOURNALIST: Are most of the buildings in Cairns built to withstand a cyclone of this size?

PREMIER: Buildings in North and Far North Queensland since Cyclone Tracy, buildings built since then have been required to be built to cyclone standards, so whether they're homes or schools or any other office block, they've been required under the building code to be built to a certain cyclone standard. Obviously in well settled areas like Cairns, there are many older homes that will not have been built to that standard and people who live in them will know that. That's why we're encouraging them to make sure that they are in the safest place that they can be.

JOURNALIST: Just on a subtle distinction, are you more worried about the wind or the flooding (inaudible)

PREMIER: I'm advised that in cyclone events, serious cyclone events around the world, more people are injured or lose their lives in the water that is associated with storm surge than in wind and flying debris, only because people are generally sensible and stay out of the wind and the flying debris. In terms of what is more dangerous, it depends on people playing safe and getting out of any area that might be subject to storm surge flooding and staying inside once the serious winds start. These will be highly destructive winds. They will be higher than we experienced with Cyclone Larry and they will be life threatening if people make it their business to go outside in them. So loss of life and serious injury ultimately will depend in some respects on people being sensible, listening to the warnings, taking advice and not treating this as a tourist event. It will be a display of the awesome power of nature, but it's not something you want to go outside and watch.

JOURNALIST: How long will you give them before you physically move them out? Mandatorily move them out?

STEWART: Certainly we hope that most people will move when instructed to do so.

JOURNALIST: And if they don't? What's the latest that you will send people in to shift them?

STEWART: Well, door knocking is already starting in these areas to warn people and to ask them to move voluntarily. The mandatory issue comes in when we actually direct them to move. The problem then becomes one of capacity, because if we have large numbers of people who are still in place that we're asking to move, obviously there are practical issues in how do you actually forcibly ask large numbers of people to move when you're moving towards a very dangerous event like this. So there are some really critical factors in the practicality of, of.

JOURNALIST: What I'm trying to establish is what's the latest that you can do this.

STEWART: Oh certainly. This will go on throughout the night if necessary. As we've already said at about 8 o'clock tomorrow morning, on current predictions it will become dangerous and high-risk to be driving about or walking about or doing anything outside due to the force of the winds that are expected tomorrow morning in the critical areas where the crossing will take place.

JOURNALIST: So the key time to move is before the light disappears today.

STEWART: Partly, but certainly it doesn't stop us working right throughout the night, and we're capable of doing that.

JOURNALIST: Are you concerned about cyclone watchers like during the actual cyclone? Like, will police have to patrol the streets for that reason?

STEWART: It's standard practice that all emergency services workers get to a point where they actually shelter in place, too, because we don't want them to put their lives at risk. We need them to be available to us immediately the danger's passed to help deal with the post-cyclonic event as well.

JOURNALIST: So if anyone's stupid enough to go out, they're on their own.

STEWART: That's pretty much right, absolutely. I mean if people go out and purposely go out and get into strife, get into some difficult or create a high risk.. sending emergency services workers out into that environment is not necessarily practical or sensible.

JOURNALIST: Premier, are you still anticipating a 3.30 update?

PREMIER: Yes.

JOURNALIST: Will there be more this evening?

PREMIER: We will have an update from the bureau at 5 and I've already agreed to a number of live crosses into news with any updated information out of the 5 o'clock and there won't be any further updates after that. Not scheduled, but if anything dramatic happens, we would of course advice you through alerts and other press releases. So 3:30 here and then further advice out of the 5 o'clock State Disaster Management Group where we have the.that will be the latest modelling. The last modelling for the day from the bureau and then no scheduled updates beyond that, but then again tomorrow morning at 9:30.

JOURNALIST: And is there any further update Premier from the airports and definite times of closures?

PREMIER: I hope to have that by 3:30. Thank you.

==============================================================

[ozbob]

TC Yasi

IR --> http://www.goes.noaa.gov/sohemi/sohemiloops/shirgmscol.html

BOM --> http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDQ65002.shtml

[ozbob]

Twitter

Queensland_Rail
 
Here's a great Queensland Government site with some handy tools and resources you might need during Tropical ... http://fb.me/yZPNFL8n

4 minutes ago via Facebook

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
03/02/2011

TRANSCRIPT: PREMIER ANNA BLIGH PRESS CONFERENCE 930PM WEDNESDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2011

E & O E - PROOF ONLY
TRANSCRIPT PRESS CONFERENCE
930PM WEDNESDAY
2 FEBRUARY 2011
KEDRON

PREMIER ANNA BLIGH: Cyclone Yasi continues to be on track to cross the Queensland coast around midnight and its maintaining its intensity as a category 5 cyclone. It has however slowed down slightly and is now travelling at about 25 kilometres an hour. If it did continue to slow there would be two effects of that. Firstly, it would mean that the storm surges would be further away from the high tide and would be lower than we have been currently predicting. In terms of flood inundation and storm surges that would be a good thing. However if it is crossing the coast at a slower rate then that means it will sit over towns and communities for longer and bring those destructive winds to those communities for a longer period of time, so rather than moving quickly across them it will sit and cause more destruction from wind. So whichever way we go with this cyclone we are going to see devastating impacts whether its from wind or from the tidal storm surges. We have continu ed to see very strong wave action in some of those areas south of where we anticipate it will cross which remains the Innisfail to Cardwell area. I talked earlier about record wave heights being recorded at Townsville. This afternoon there was a record height of 6.6 metres being recorded, the largest since records were kept in 1975. Just about half an hour ago they recorded a wave height of 9.5 metres off Townsville, that's 2.9 metres higher than it was this afternoon. So we are seeing very strong wave activity off the seas of Townsville. That obviously will translate into significant flooding activity at some point in some of those low lying areas. The number of people who are without power in this region has almost doubled since my last report with 61 000 customers now offline. So we are starting to see the rate of power failure considerably accelerate. It's still relatively quiet and calm out there in terms of calls to emergency workers. We are starting to see calls comin g in but only about 150 across the region so that's very low levels of activity and we are expecting that that will grow, particularly around that area, Innisfail and Caldwell, and related areas.

JOURNALIST: And what kind of things have people been asking for Premier?

PREMIER: This is just a record of how many people have rung the SES hotline so this will be a range of calls; people ringing to say that they are experiencing high winds or people saying that they may have started to see their roofs peel off or windows smash. So it will be the full range of household damages. Did you want to add to that Ian?

DEPUTY POLICE COMMISSIONER IAN STEWART: Certainly. Things like trees down. We are hearing lots of stories about that. So I'm sure they will be the type of calls coming in through the SES.

JOURNALIST: So no cries for help at this stage?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: Unfortunately, we've heard our first call from Port Hinchinbrook from a person who rang up and said they need to evacuate. All we can do is provide them with our support and certainly advice on what they should do in relation to sheltering in place. But this is the first call.

JOURNALIST: [Inaudible]

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: Not at all. All we're asking them to do is to go to the safest part of their house and bunker down.

PREMIER: Conditions are now.

JOURNALIST: Is that a direct request of people, balancing these huge surges that are going to swamp towns like that with the clear instruction that its too dangerous to be outside and you should stay put. For people who refused to evacuate and stay in those low areas, what advice can you give them now?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: The only advice we can give them is the advice that we have given all the way through, all the hints on how to try and protect themselves as best they can at this stage because they can't go outside, that is too high risk and we can't send people to them.

JOURNALIST: In this specific instance, will you continue to monitor this person's safety?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: Yes, while we can still communicate with that particular person, that's right. But we don't know for how long that will be.

JOURNALIST: Can you just clarify, is that an area where you urged people to evacuate?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: I'd have to double check that. I know that this person is in a two story area because we've told them to get up to the higher story so I'm suggesting that it is probably one of the inundation areas but I'll check that and provide that information.

JOURNALIST: Is it a family that's involved?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: I don't know that. I've only just got this call from our people to say they've had that call at Innisfail.

PREMIER: And it is very distressing and we do expect to get more calls like this. But the time has now passed when it is safe for emergency workers to respond to these sorts of calls. We are now seeing winds across these areas of more than 120 kilometres an hour, we're seeing torrential rain and we are seeing the beginnings of some serious wave activity. These are not conditions in which we can send out emergency workers. These are not conditions where you can put up a helicopter to do a winch rescue. All of that is now beyond the realms of possibility. So we are going to see more, I think, more distressed phone calls and its going to be very difficult for our emergency workers and the people in our call centre, people often forget about them, but the people who hear the first calls of distress are the people who answer our phones and they'll be doing it tough tonight.

JOURNALIST: Premier, the massive wave at Townsville, that is just enormous. Is the warning to people, as much as you can forecast what it might be, it could be even worse?

PREMIER: The fact that we've seen a high wave registered on the gauge out off Point Cleveland in Townsville does not necessarily translate to a nine metre wave coming in onto Townsville's foreshore but it just is indicative of how high these seas are and by the time they hit land, that they will be, we expect to match what our predictions were. The only thing that will temper that is if the cyclone continues to slow a little and comes across later because that will mean it'll be that its be further away from the high tide.

JOURNALIST: The 61 000 homes, do you know roughly where they are?

PREMIER: Most of them continue to be in and around that Innisfail/Cardwell area but we have substantial suburbs in Cairns and Townsville out with a number of those include areas outside of the danger zone, in Proserpine, Arlie Beach where we saw many homes go out this afternoon because even 80 kilometre winds this afternoon took down powerlines there.

JOURNALIST: The wave measuring device, is that on the seaward side of Magnetic Island and would you expect Magnetic Island to mitigate the size of the wave?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: If you know the shape of the bay at Townsville, its on the southern side, outside of the point, the main point of that. So its quite some distance from Magnetic Island. But that's indicative of the waves sizes that would be on the seaward side of Magnetic at this time. And remember we've still go four hours to go probably until we see the highest winds, the highest waves.

JOURNALIST: So would you expect that wave to hit Magnetic Island before it hits the Townsville area?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: Waves of that height will now be hitting that seaward side of Magnetic Island because that's where the waves are being measured out at that level.

JOURNALIST: So far so good for phone systems?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: As far as we know yes.

PREMIER: We haven't had any reports yet of any mobile phone towers down and we're still able to make contact on the normal mobile network with the senior people in each district reporting into us so that's good.

JOURNALIST: Has Magnetic Island got emergency staff on the Island?

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER: Certainly there are police there, absolutely. And obviously they've been instructed to care for the community, in the same way as we have everywhere. But again, they're in the same boat. Everyone has moved up to high ground to either shelter with friends or family or other places on the Island. That was available to them. The ferries I think only stopped running yesterday.

PREMIER: And of course Palm Island is a little further to the north and closer to the critical danger zone but out in a little bit further out to see.

ENDS

==============================================================




Brisbanetimes --> Yasi weakens to category three

Some regions hit hard and still being hit, others missed a 'bullet' ..

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
03/02/2011

YASI PROMPTS ACTIVATION OF NATURAL DISASTER RELIEF AND RECOVERY ARRANGEMENTS

The joint State and Federal Government-funded Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements have been activated to assist the victims of Tropical Cyclone Yasi.

Premier Anna Bligh said the arrangements had been activated for 19 local government areas - Burdekin, Burke, Cairns, Carpentaria, Cassowary Coast, Charters Towers, Croydon, Doomadgee, Etheridge, Flinders, Hinchinbrook, Mackay, Mount Isa, Palm Island, Tablelands, Townsville, Whitsunday, Wujal Wujal and Yarrabah.

"Activating these arrangements now means those people whose lives have been directly impacted by Severe Tropical Cyclone Yasi can get the assistance they need," the Premier said.

"People suffering hardship following TC Yasi and unable to meet their immediate needs to effect their recovery can contact the Department of Communities to access a range of supports and services.

"The number to call is 1800 173 349. The Department of Communities will also be deploying staff to the effected areas to meet with face-to-face with those experiencing hardship."

The Premier said assistance had also been activated for local councils to cover the coast of counter disaster operations.

"This ensures that local councils are not burdened with the cost of preparing for and responding to this unprecedented weather event."

Ms Bligh said her government would not hesitate to activate further assistance measures in additional local government areas should the need arise.

"We have started to see just how much damage Yasi has caused in North Queensland communities and there's no doubt the damage bill from this event will continue to rise," the Premier said.

"The State and Federal Government are standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the community as it starts to recover from Yasi's fury."

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
03/02/2011

PREMIER'S DISASTER RELIEF FUND WILL COVER CYCLONE VICTIMS

The Premier's Disaster Relief Fund will be extended to cover damage caused by Tropical Cyclone Yasi in North Queensland.

Premier Anna Bligh said Australians had shown remarkable generosity in their response to the recent flooding crisis in Queensland.

"The flooding disaster grew into something absolutely unprecedented in our State and now North Queensland has faced nature's fury," said the Premier.

"The generosity of Australians to date has been incredible and we are going to need every ounce of their compassion to recover from what we have already faced and what now lies ahead.

"North Queensland has been in nature's firing line and the people of that region need our help.

"I want to reassure them that the Premier's Disaster Relief Fund will be there for them, just as it is for the victims of flooding in other regions across the State."

Ms Bligh said the fund now stands at $192,470,566 and called on Australians to dig deep again to help those in North Queensland.

"I know they have been digging deep, but my message once again is that we need you to keep digging," she said.

"If you've already donated I'm asking you to think about giving again. And if you've yet to give something please think about making any contribution that you can."

The State Government is encouraging people donating to the Premier's Disaster Relief Appeal to donate online or in person to free up call centre staff and phone lines for emergency calls.

Donations can be made on the Queensland Government website, www.qld.gov.au/floods, and also in person at any Queensland branch of the Bank of Queensland (BoQ), Commonwealth Bank, Westpac, ANZ, NAB, Suncorp, St George Bank, Bank West, Bank SA, Australian Central Credit Union and the Savings and Loans Credit Union.

People can also make donations at Coles Supermarkets and cheques can be made out to the Premier's Disaster Relief Appeal.

==============================================================

[ozbob]

Premier and Minister for the Arts
The Honourable Anna Bligh
03/02/2011

TRANSCRIPT - PRESS CONFERENCE - 9.30AM

TRANSCRIPT

PRESS CONFERENCE 0930

THURSDAY 3 FEBRUARY 2011

INTV: PREMIER ANNA BLIGH; POLICE COMMISSIONER BOB ATKINSON

RE: UPDATE ON CYCLONE YASI; NATURAL DISASTER RELIEF PAYMENTS; FLOOD APPEAL TO BROADEN TO A WIDER DISASTER APPEAL; THREE BABIES SAFELY BORN LAST NIGHT DURING THE STORM EVENT; QUEENSLAND'S RECONSTRUCTION EFFORT

Bligh: As we went to bed last night we did so holding some very grave concerns for safety of friends and loved ones in North Queensland and Far North Queensland. It is a great relief this morning to be able to say at this stage that we have no reports of fatalities or any serious injuries. We have had reports from every evacuation centre were we have had no structural damage and every one of the 10,500 people who spent a distressed and uncomfortable night in these centres is safe today. I must stress that these are still early reports we have some small and quite isolated communities from whom we have yet to hear any reports so we and we will certainly be monitoring those throughout the day but the early reports have given us all I think a great sense of relief this morning. Nevertheless we face extensive damage in some parts of the north and far north and we continue to see a very dangerous situation in many parts of the region. I can take you through some of this. The Cy clone is now at a category 2 and is likely to stay at a category 2 until this afternoon and then weaken overnight to a category 1. It is making its way through communities to the west. I have a clear message for those people - we have people safe and sound today who would have been in the path of danger last night if they hadn't listened. There is no room for complacency, it may be weakening but it is still a powerful storm and may mean danger for your communities. Please don't take this lightly, please listen to authorities. The storm surge in a number of areas overnight was lower than expected but still quite damaging in some places with quite high surges reported in a number of areas. We have a situation emerging in a number of places around a second storm surge associated with the high tide that's occurring right now. You may have seen some of the early footage out of Cairns and Townsville we had waves crashing over the esplanade in Cairns and we have significant water r ising in areas like Rose Bay and Pallarenda in Townsville. These are being reported by authorities there as significantly higher and larger that what they saw last night. So this is still a very dangerous situation in Cairns and Townsville around those storm surge areas. For that reason, evacuation centres will remain in lock-down until after the high tide has passed and that won't be until later this morning. We now move to a serious monitoring of what the rainfall that this storm brought is bringing into river systems and catchment areas. We've seen extremely high levels of rainfall in a short period of time in a number of these areas. We've had falls as high as 200mm as far south as Mackay in a very concentrated period.

So we're now seeing strong flood activity in the Tully River through to Giru and what that means is that in places like Ingham, they are now preparing for at least moderate flooding this afternoon. But if the rainfall continues at its current rate, that could be revised up to heavy and serious flooding and Ingham.

In Townsville, we expect major flooding in the northern suburbs and in the areas just north of Townsville through their river systems, and at Giru this afternoon heavy flooding. In the areas of the Upper Burdekin, again heavy flooding throughout today, and this afternoon we would expect for example for that to cut the Macrossan Bridge which links Townsville to Charters Towers.

There is a heavy rain band that is continuing between the north of Townsville right down to Mackay and that rain band will and already is bringing flooding and we will give further reports about that throughout the day but that may necessitate some evacuations and it may reach dangerous levels in part.

This system has affected different communities in different ways, and I'll just take you through some of the major areas and what we know so far about those areas. As you're probably aware, Cairns seems to have escaped the worst of this storm and is according to all assessments so far in relatively good shape. Significant power outages, power lines down, debris on the roads, however, no major structural infrastructure damage at this stage. The port and the airport are now being assessed, and the city believes that it can be back to fully operational within 24 hours.

The Aboriginal community of Yarrabah similarly reports, as do northern Aboriginal communities Wujal Wujal, ah, and Hopevale, no or little damage. As I said, in Cairns right now, we're seeing quite spectacular waves apparently over the Esplanade as a result of that second storm surge. The Tablelands, the Mareeba area reports extensive roads cut from debris but otherwise very little structural damage, a couple of houses with roofs off.

By far the hardest hit area is the area around Innisfail. The cyclone crossed around the Mission Beach area and what we've seen is those small communities take the full brunt of this very serious storm system. So the hardest hit towns are Tully, Silkwood, Mission Beach, Innisfail and Cardwell.

In Innisfail we're seeing for example very serious outages of power with power poles literally snapped in half and in all of those areas they're now getting a very high number of requests for assistance and the early assessments indicating extensive damage. In Tully for example, the early estimate is that one in three houses has been either lost its roof or completely demolished and more than 20% of businesses in the main area significantly impacted. Similarly widespread reports in that area of major crop damage and still being assessed.

Mission Beach, on very early assessments, are seeing some damage but maybe not as much as earlier thought, but it's still subject to a comprehensive assessment.

The town of Cardwell has been very difficult to get into but I can advise that emergency crews have cut their way into Cardwell in the last 20 minutes or so, so we've only got very early reports. But the emergency crews report what they say is significant devastation of the township of Cardwell. Older houses, most of the older houses in town have been significantly damaged or completely demolished. Newer houses have fared much better, but there's been extensive force into this town. For those of you who don't know Cardwell, it sits, there's the ocean, the highway and then the township. Boats have been pushed two blocks up into the township. So they have experienced significant storm surge and that has caused extensive damage.

Coming further south, Townsville has experienced very, very heavy overnight. It's experienced some of the heaviest rainfall and winds and is continuing to do so. Townsville is still experiencing quite damaging and dangerous conditions with flying debris. At the moment, and you'll appreciate in these conditions, it's hard to get a full assessment, but authorities are saying despite all of that, the damage doesn't look too bad but it is only a preliminary assessment because of the difficult weather. It is as I said still a dangerous situation and evacuation centres are not being unlocked at this stage.

We are seeing flooding, as I indicated, and there is an early report of water, the damage, sorry.damage to the water treatment plant in Townsville. It's too early yet to say just what that damage will mean for the water supply, but we're monitoring it.

There will be some big logistical exercises today in managing some of the people who have been evacuated and who will be unable to go back into their own homes. And just by way of one example, in a college at Townsville there are currently 200 high care aged patients being cared for. 40 of those are from a nursing home in Cardwell and today while the school was a very good place to keep them sheltered and safe overnight, it is not where they can be adequately cared for for a long period of time. So a very significant planning exercise is now being undertaken to relocate those patients either if possible back to some of their own nursing homes, although most of them come from areas that are currently flooding in Townsville or otherwise into other parts of Queensland.

The island of Palm Island I'm very pleased to report, ah, reports that all is well on Palm. No buildings have seen significant damage, although we've got some roofs off. A very high number of powerlines down, ah, and the water in Palm Island is fine. So we'll get a further assessment but Palm Island, despite being out there in the middle of all of that appears to have come through reasonably well.

The town of Ingham and the surrounding shire of Hinchinbrook reporting some damage, a number of roads closed, but their focus right now on preparing for what is likely to be quite a significant flood event in the Ingham area.

That really I think gives you a snapshot of the areas that have been mostly impacted and affected. If I can just go now to some of the essential services and what that means for people in this whole region whether they've been affected by the cyclone or not.

Powerlink, in relation to our major transmission lines, report that the electricity supply line, that is the main spine going inland taking power into the high voltage line taking electricity into North Queensland, has not been damaged and is intact. So we're very relieved about that. However, the supply line coming down into those coastal communities has been cut south of Innisfail. It is not clear yet why it has been cut and we won't know until they are able to get into the air and check all along that system. I should say that that requires checking four hundred kilometres of line and 500 transmission towers. By way of example, ah, we had a tower go down on that line just before Christmas and it took two weeks to get it operational again. So we don't yet if we have multiple towers out.

Ah, in relation to electricity supply, we have 177,000 homes who are without electricity supply, some because of that transmission break, others simply because of the extensive damage done to powerlines and power poles. To give you a big of a sense of where the biggest impact is, in Townsville only 15% of the City of Townsville has electricity supply at the moment. The town of Ingham has no electricity supply. About 34% of Cairns has supply, and in Mackay-Proserpine about half of all homes have supply. So this cyclone is still moving west and our electricity providers indicate that they expect that 177,000 to grow and get up over the 200,000 mark.

Many.I do ask people to understand that many Ergon staff have been affected themselves. Many of them are in evacuation centres and their homes have been affected or they are cut off from their workplaces. That means we're bringing southern teams in and they are arriving in the area this morning with a view to getting them out on the ground as quickly as we can. We have 100 generators being supplied and further generators being supplied if needed from the Army to resupply critical infrastructure - things like water treatment plants that many need generators to pump to keep them moving.

I do need to say to some people in this region that you are going to have to be very patient in some areas about electricity supply and to give you an example, in Cyclone Larry it took a full four weeks before every single person who lost supply on the night of the cyclone was fully restored to power. We will clearly be doing everything in our power to do that faster, but it's a much wider region and we've yet to find some of the areas that are causing the problem.

We have, um, teams of emergency workers, as I've said, trying to get their way into isolated towns. They are at the moment cutting their way into Mission Beach. They've just got into Cardwell and there are many other small towns in that area that they will be trying to get into. Of course we also have many isolated rural properties that will take some time to assess.

In relation to the telecommunications, Telstra is reporting, ah, 25 of their stations out and that means they've been destroyed by the cyclone and will take some time to get operational again and that's mainly in that Innisfail-Ingham hardest hit area. But right from Mackay to Cairns, there are 450 points on the network that are now operating without mains power. That means they're using back-up generators and over the next six to eight hours are likely to lose that power. So unless we can get them up on mains power, people can expect significant and severe disruptions to the mobile network and their mobile capacity and we'd ask for patience.

It's too early yet to say much about major transport routes other than to say the early assessments indicate that other than major debris on the Bruce Highway, it doesn't appear to have suffered major damage, and if we can get that debris off the road, there is at least some prospect of the Bruce Highway being opened today. But people shouldn't travel on it until they get confirmation of that.

In relation to health facilities, the Tully Hospital has had part of its roof go off overnight. Ah, there are seven patients in that hospital, all of those patients and staff are safe but clearly we are working to restore safety to the Tully Hospital as soon as we can. Cairns Hospital is looking to reopen their emergency department at the hospital sometime today. They will not be opening it while that storm water surge activity is happening on the Esplanade because it would be unsafe for patients or staff to try to access the hospital. But as soon as that danger passes, we will see the emergency department of the Cairns Hospital reopen for normal business.

The Red Cross reports that overnight in the evacuation centres, people were all in good spirits and cooperating with each other in what must have been I think very difficult and very trying circumstances. One of the biggest challenges for the Red Cross today will be establishing appropriate evacuation facilities for those people who have been made homeless by this event. Their focus right now is on Tully and on ensuring they have enough accommodation in a town where we do seem to see at least one in three homes temporarily at least uninhabitable. So that will be one of the challenges today as we move into recovery phase. For example, one of the otherwise possible evacuation centres in Tully, the senior citizens hall, has been completely demolished. So, as I said, some challenges there in accommodating people who have been rendered homeless.

So I think that's most of the information that I have to give to you today. This morning as you can see it's still an unfolding event. There are still many things that are unknown and we still have people in danger out there and we still have people whose communities are in the path of a very serious storm and we're monitoring all of that along what could be some serious flooding. Nevertheless I certainly think that many people in North Queensland this morning will be breathing a sigh of relief and we certainly do that along with you. But I'm equally aware that today for some people in this region, they will be going back into their communities, going back into their neighbourhood and facing scenes of considerable devastation. There are people now who have lost their homes, they've lost their farm, they've lost their crops and they've lost their livelihoods. And I have no doubt that many of them will feel a great sense of despair as they walk back into those communities, p articularly those that only five years ago were destroyed by Cyclone Larry.

Can I say to people in that circumstance, I know that it would be tempting to feel totally overwhelmed by what you are about to go back into and what will be required of you over coming weeks as you move to restore your lives. And if you are feeling alone, can I say to you, you are not alone. Just as the people of North Queensland gave all their care and support and help and assistance to people here in the south and in the central part of the state during the floods, it's coming right back at you. You are about to find people from all over Queensland, coming into your communities to help you rebuild and restore your lives. In the immediate term, our task today is to get emergency workers on the ground and start the process of cleaning up and that's exactly what we'll be doing.

Commissioner?

Atkinson: Can I just add to the Premier's comments and in terms of in places particularly like Innisfail and Tully and ask people to be very aware of their safety in terms of fallen powerlines. I ask people in Townsville, Cairns and the areas in between not to use the roads until the authorities declare that they're safe to be used. In Townsville and Palm Island there are still reports of heavy rain and high winds and unfortunately this not over yet. This cyclone is of course an extraordinary weather event and it's unprecedented and one of the aspects of that is that it is still moving towards Mount Isa and is still assessed as being a category 1 cyclone when it hits Mount Isa, which is scheduled for 8pm this evening. So we're asking people in all the towns en route, places like Georgetown, Julia Creek, Richmond, Cloncurry and Winton, and the towns near Mount Isa such Doomadgee, Dajarra and Camooweal to take notice of the warnings, to stay inside, and that's people on the properties in that zone as well.

One of our concerns is that I don't think that people in those areas would have ever experienced a category 2 cyclone or for that matter a category 1 cyclone. So we're pleading with people in those localities to take this seriously, to stay inside and heed all the warnings. It would seem as though we've been blessed and fortunate so far. We want that to continue. Thank you.

Journalist: Premier, there's been a report of the Cassowary Coast mayor having some concerns (inaudible) 100 people (inaudible). Have you heard anything about that?

Bligh: Well, certainly the mayor of the Cassowary Coast advised the Disaster Management Group this morning that there are a number of smaller communities in his region, which are totally inaccessible at the moment. As we speak we have emergency teams out literally cutting their way into these communities. Ah, the Cassowary Coast is the area that has some of those towns that have taken the biggest brunt and some of them are cut off by massive debris and trees being brought down. So yes, there are a many unknowns, as much as we do breathe a sigh of relief because the early reports indicate that people are safe, it is not over yet and I don't for one minute think that we can't, ah. We can still expect I think the possibility of sad and bad news. So we are monitoring and we are out there literally cutting our way into communities to find people who might be unsafe.

Journalist: (Inaudible) concerns last night about a group of six people at Port Hinchinbrook, you know, in a unit (?). Is there any information about how they survived?

Bligh: Yes, I'm very pleased to advise that the six people we heard of last night at Port Hinchinbrook have been spoken to directly this morning and they are safe and well.

Journalist: Premier, those reports of up to 100, they may be based on Cardwell, which was (inaudible) have been evacuated, but I understand up to 100 people who'd stayed behind in Cardwell, can you shed any light on that and has there been any contact made with anyone who did stay behind in Cardwell?

Bligh: Literally as I walked into this briefing this morning, ah, we got late breaking news that the emergency teams had just cut into Cardwell. So other than being able to tell you that they've struck significant devastation. We are unable to advise any further on Cardwell, but we'll do so as soon as we can. But remember that, ah.

Journalist: (Inaudible)

Bligh: Ah, look, it's impossible for me to say whether people did or not. Certainly the mayor indicated that the whole town was to be evacuated. We certainly understood that people had taken that warning very seriously. As I said, Cardwell is right on the water. It is literally on the waterfront. I can't rule out that some people chose not to take that advice. But we do now that we have a number of very small towns in and around this area that would have between 50 and 100 residents and nobody has heard from them yet and we haven't got any crews into them.

Journalist: Premier (inaudible) warning we were facing a catastrophic event. As you say, so far the news is good. How much are you putting that down to preparations that were made?

Bligh: I don't think there is any doubt that the fact that authorities, local governments and people on the ground prepared so well for this event in advance and most importantly the fact that the citizens of these towns took the warning seriously and acted accordingly and cooperated with great courage and resilience and patience is the reason so many of them are safe and well and alive this morning.

But I do stress that there are still places we have yet to get reports from, and we won't be saying we've dodged bullets until we know everyone is safe.

Journalist: What emergency payments are available for people who have lost everything?

Bligh: Ah, thank you for that question. I'm very pleased to say that the Prime Minister and I have this morning approved these areas as eligible for natural disaster relief payments. Clearly some of these communities are inaccessible at the moment, but the minute we can get recovery teams in there, we'll be making payments available to people. And obviously depending on their circumstances, we'll be looking to work out what's the most appropriate form of relief for them.

Journalist: After Larry, there were some concerns at Innisfail that people weren't getting the money fast enough. Have you addressed those concerns (inaudible)

Bligh: Again, it will depend in some communities about how quickly we can get teams on the ground. But we do have teams of recovery, ah, ah, staff from Department of Communities and Centrelink staff ready to go in. As you've heard, some of these communities are still experiencing torrential rain and serious dangerous winds. We will not be sending people in until that's alleviated and until we've got a safe place for them to be. But as soon as we can get people on the ground, we will be making those relief payments available to everyone who needs them.

Journalist: Premier, will you (inaudible)

Bligh: Yes. Ah, now that we know. Now we've come a little bit further down the track, I can confirm that of course the flood appeal will now have to broaden out to be a wider disaster appeal. I do anticipate that more people will be able to access their insurance payments because there won't be any dispute about the definition of the event they've just experienced. It doesn't have the same problems of the definition of flooding. Nevertheless I do expect that we will find people in very difficult and extreme circumstances and of course we'll be doing everything we can through our relief appeal to look after them, too.

Journalist: (Inaudible)

Bligh: I don't.

Atkinson: I'm sorry, I didn't hear that question.

Journalist: (Inaudible) ships, will they be (inaudible)

Bligh: Oh, this was. Sorry. Ah, at this stage they were contemplated and put on alert, given the possibility that there may be no operational base for the recovery effort. So for example, if either the city of Cairns or Townsville was so devastated that they couldn't support an operating base, we would have looked at possibly locating one on a ship offshore. As we've seen both Cairns and Townsville will be able to support an operating base from which we can build the recovery effort so we don't believe that will be necessary.

Journalist: (Inaudible) power supply, the inland spine, is that now completely out of danger given that the storm is moving across the state?

Bligh: It has moved past that area. It is intact and we're very, very pleased about that. It makes this effort considerably, ah, more, ah, more, ah, easier.

Journalist: In terms of essential supplies, though, with water treatment plants out, are there any sewerage treatment plants out as well?

Bligh: We still have councils out on the ground checking all of their water and sewerage treatment plants. As I indicated we've got an early report out of Townsville that at least one water treatment plant has incurred some damage. The extent of it is yet being worked through. That is why we will have generators. For example, some of the water treatment plants may be inoperable where there is no mains power supply without generating capacity. So that is critical infrastructure and that will be prioritised for major generation capacity. So as we get more and more reports throughout today and tomorrow, we'll be able to give a better picture of essential services. I should say that in Tully and Cardwell, the council have, ah, are unable to supply water and residents have been advised to boil water in those two areas but nowhere else at this stage.

Journalist: Premier, has this firmed up your thinking about a permanent disaster (inaudible)

Bligh: I haven't had an opportunity to give that much thought overnight at all. But without a doubt it's an extreme circumstance in our country's history for any place to have a rolling set of disasters as we've had. The worst floods in our history across three-quarters of the state, followed by the worst cyclone over a huge area in more than a century or almost a century. So it would be, ah, of course we're going to sit down and work out what are the lessons from this. Whether it does mean we look at things like disaster funds I think are a question for the coming weeks. Right now we've still got people in danger out there, we've still got emergency workers trying to make sure that people are safe and alive and that's going to be our priority today. We will have to look at money, we will have to look at infrastructure, but today, people are number one.

Journalist: (Inaudible) situation a couple of days ago about another system, another cyclone forming behind Yasi. Have you had any Weather Bureau advice on that?

Bligh: No, the bureau is still advising that there are no other systems yet forming or formed. However, we remain on alert for what we know is continuing storm and wet season.

Journalist: It's going to be a big problem if you've got these communities without electricity, without communications and you've got another cyclone bearing down, which is likely given it's been reported. That's a (inaudible)

Bligh: That is why it is so critical that we put electricity and telecommunications at the forefront of our recovery effort. Ensuring that people can access information in the context of possible future events, even current events such as flooding are absolutely critical. That's why we've got crews flying in today and every effort will be made to restore all of those essential services. But these are difficult, dangerous and very isolated places in some cases, and we need to be realistic about what's possible.

Journalist: Have there been any arrests during this event?

Atkinson: Not that I'm aware of, no, and I'd like to take that opportunity to thank people for their understanding and their patience. We had 8000 people in temporary shelters in Cairns, and I think over 2000 in Townsville and it was done very quickly, and obviously, you know, the facilities weren't, um, evacuation centres as we had at the exhibition grounds here for the floods and in other places. But I think overall given the shortness of time, um, that went as well as we could possibly have hoped for. And again if we could just thank all the people who are there for their patience and their tolerance and their understanding.

Journalist: (Inaudible)

Atkinson: As the Premier's indicated, the assessments are still being conducted. In some places, we're still, you know, having trouble getting in because of the trees and that over the road. But at this stage, police residences both at Mission Beach and at Silkwood have been damaged. Um, we believe they will be able to maintain police operations in both those towns.

Journalist: Premier, just in terms of the inland communities that are now going to get the storm, what things are in place to ensure that they get services back to normal as quickly as possible?

Bligh: These are small communities going into the western part of the state, but their councils have been preparing along with the coastal councils now for a number of days. Some messages have been getting out to people about making preparations, ensuring that they're in higher parts of town, relocating where they need to, and clearly as we get reports as the cyclone makes its way, they will be getting the same support as major coastal centres. They'll be getting emergency crews, they'll be getting electricity restoration teams and it doesn't matter whether they're little tiny towns of ten people or major regional centres with thousands. Every one of them is critical to our state and every one of them will be looked after.

I should have said of course along with, ah, I think every Australian, I welcome to the world the three babies that were born in the middle of this crisis last night. I don't think anybody can imagine what it must have been like, particularly for the mum at the Redlynch State School evacuation centre. Congratulations to her and her family on the birth, the very safe birth of their child. A huge thanks to the midwife who assisted in the birth who was here on holiday from the United Kingdom for her 25th wedding anniversary. So an extraordinary story, and a great powerful symbol I think of resilience and survival.

Having given birth myself, the idea of doing it in a school hall with 1000 people, ah, one can only begin imagine. So well done to all of them.

Two other babies safely born just before 11 o'clock at Innisfail Hospital. Innisfail Hospital of course right in the eye of the storm just an hour later. So we're very pleased that all of those three little ones made it safely into the world.

Journalist: (Inaudible)

Bligh: Clearly we will now give some significant thought to how we conduct the reconstruction effort. Yet again, the reconstruction effort of our state has increased exponentially in a matter of days. Every time we start to settle down into the task, we have a new task put onto the plate. Those arrangements will now, we'll have a really good look at what can reasonably be accommodated and how we will manage it and we'll advise people as soon as we settle on those.

Thank you.

==============================================================

[colinw]

QR Regional Recovery Taskforce page:
http://www.queenslandrail.com.au/AboutUs/MediaCentre/DisasterRecovery/Pages/RegionalRecoveryTaskforce.aspx

... and flood recovery photo gallery:
http://www.queenslandrail.com.au/AboutUs/MediaCentre/DisasterRecovery/Pages/FloodRecoveryPhotos.aspx

[ozbob]

QR http://www.queenslandrail.com.au/AboutUs/MediaCentre/DisasterRecovery/Pages/DisasterRecovery.aspx

3 February 2011 @ 2.00PM

      Our thoughts are with those in North Queensland affected by Cyclone Yasi.

      While it is too early to estimate the amount of damage caused by the cyclone, Queensland Rail is already making arrangements for track inspections to get people and food supplies moving through the affected regions as soon as possible.

      The Queensland Rail Regional Recovery Taskforce will oversee the cyclone recovery efforts, this involves coordinating inspections and, where required, repairs to our tracks, communications centres and infrastructure. As long as safety can be assured, our crews will start to conduct physical inspections of the rail network as soon as this afternoon. Until the assessments have been carried out, we are unable to say when services will resume.

      Train services into Rockhampton have now resumed but there will be no services travelling north of Rockhampton until our North Queensland-based network control, which operates our northern network, reopens. This means the Rockhampton Tilt Train and the eastbound Spirit of the Outback service (ex-Emerald) will both travel into Rockhampton. The Bundaberg Tilt Train will also continue operating as per its normal schedule today.

      The next Traveltrain service scheduled to travel north of Rockhampton is expected to run on Friday (ex-Brisbane), however, this is subject to damage caused overnight to the rail network.

[ozbob]

Twitter

# Queensland_Rail
 
The Cairns Tilt Train is scheduled to depart Brisbane this evening, however, this may change depending on track... http://fb.me/BGuvKw4y
about 1 hour ago via Facebook

# Queensland Rail Queensland_Rail
 
North Queensland network control has resumed operations, allowing services to travel from Brisbane to as far north... http://fb.me/QQxhbsRr
about 1 hour ago via Facebook

[ozbob]

It is time to move as much freight as possible to electric rail. 

From the Brisbanetimes click here!

Future cyclones could be more extreme: Garnaut

Future cyclones could be more extreme: Garnaut
Lenore Taylor
February 4, 2011

CYCLONE YASI is probably early real-world evidence of scientific predictions that global warming will lead to more extreme weather events, according to the government's expert climate change adviser, Professor Ross Garnaut.

He says that if it is, given the evidence that global warming is tracking at the highest end of international predictions, then future cyclones could prove that we ''ain't seen nothing yet''.

Professor Garnaut said scientists and climate change modelling had predicted global warming would lead to more frequent extreme weather events, including cyclones and bushfires.

The prediction of more extreme storms already appeared to be verified by data from the north Atlantic. While there was not yet sufficient statistical data to prove more frequent extreme cyclones in Australia, ''there is no reason to think the physics will work differently in Australian air than north Atlantic air'', Professor Garnaut said.

''I would say the odds seem to favour the proposition that cyclonic events will be more intense in a hotter world and bear in mind ... if this is the case we are just at the beginning of the warming process, the warming since pre-industrial times is 1 degree, the science says without mitigation ... that first degree is just the beginning, and so if we are seeing an intensification of extreme weather events now, you ain't seen nothing yet.''

Professor Garnaut is revising and updating his 2008 climate change review for the Gillard government and the multi-party climate change committee. He said that since his 2008 review the scientific evidence for global warming had become stronger.

''All the measurable impacts are tracking right at the top of the range of possibilities ... or in some cases above them ... there is no major area, unfortunately, where sceptical views of the science can draw any strength from the peer-reviewed science, the real science, that has been done in the past five years - all of the evidence appears to be in the other direction,'' he told journalists yesterday.

This week the Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce attacked the Greens for linking increased extreme weather events with climate change because cyclones have occurred for hundreds of years. The government hopes to legislate a carbon price by the end of the year.

[ozbob]

Twitter

Queensland_Rail
 
The Cairns Tilt Train, which was scheduled to depart Brisbane this evening, has now been cancelled. Queensland... http://fb.me/SdOiTjoL
17 minutes ago via Facebook

[ozbob]

Twitter

Queensland_Rail
 
Kuranda Scenic Rail services have also been cancelled this weekend, however, services are expected to resume on... http://fb.me/SjeX04PA
15 minutes ago via Facebook

[ozbob]

QR http://www.queenslandrail.com.au/AboutUs/MediaCentre/DisasterRecovery/Pages/DisasterRecovery.aspx

4 February 2011 @ 2.00PM

      While it is still too early to estimate the amount of damage caused by the cyclone, Queensland Rail crews continue inspecting infrastructure across northern Queensland and are working hard to ensure vital transport and freight services are restored.

      The Cairns Tilt Train, which was scheduled to depart Brisbane this evening, has now been cancelled. Queensland Rail will be contacting customers affected by this cancellation.

      The decision has also been made to cancel Kuranda Scenic Rail services this weekend, however, services are expected to resume on Tuesday following thorough inspections of operating conditions.

      North Queensland network control has resumed operations, allowing services to travel from Brisbane to as far north as Mackay with the line to Bowen also expected to open this afternoon. The line between Bowen and Townsville has water over the tracks in parts and will remain closed until the water recedes and inspections can be completed. During this time Queensland Rail will be inspecting damaged boom gates in the northern region, which will need to be repaired before services can resume.

      The Mount Isa line remains closed with further track inspections yet to be carried out.

      We are thankful that at this stage there are no reports of major damage to Queensland Rail stations or depots, allowing us to focus our efforts on track inspections and repairs.