Rookie Reporter
Queensland Floods
While Victorians try to rebuild their lives after the fires, Queenslanders are cleaning up after a natural disaster left parts of their state underwater. It's the wet season in the north of Australia so cyclones and monsoonal rain are expected, but not this bad. It's the worst floods in the region's history. Catherine finds out more and takes a look at how floods happen.
Broadcast: Tue 17 Feb 2009, 11:00am
CATHERINE ELLIS, REPORTING: The rain started falling on the first of January and just kept coming. Eventually more than half the state was affected by floods- an area the size of South Australia!
Whole towns were swamped, major roads blocked, homes, businesses and farms destroyed and animals killed. Ingham, north of Townsville, was the worst affected. It was hit by two major floods in one week.
JENNY MORRIS, RESIDENT: That was the second time...the first time it came to the top of the fridge.
BRUNO, RESIDENT: I've been here for 68 years and I've never seen it like this before.
Many people had to be rescued. And the local school was turned into an evacuation centre. The Cartwrights were stuck in their home for a week.
JAYNE CARTWRIGHT, MUM: We had water downstairs in our house neck deep... we've lost everything that was downstairs, beds, fridges.
KIERA CARTWRIGHT, DAUGHTER: It has been our first flood in town and it's quite scary to know that this could happen again in the next year or so.
Boats and helicopters had to be used to get fresh food and medicine to people. The wildlife also suffered. Many animals got washed away.
JENNY: I've seen a metre and a half crocodile over near the creek..I've seen wallabies swimming for their lives..plenty of snakes.
This Freshwater croc got run over trying to cross a road. It survived but it busted the car's tyre!
So how did this flood happen.
CATHERINE: Well since the beginning of the year they've had trillions of litres of rain. As you can imagine, to start with, the thirsty plants and soil soaked it up like a sponge.
Butt after a while the ground became saturated and when it couldn't take anymore the water just ran off.
It rushed to find lower ground - rivers, creeks or dams. But when they filled up and had more water than they could handle, they burst their banks and that caused even more flooding.
But as well as long periods of heavy rain, there was another type of flooding
called a 'flash flood'. That's where you get lots of rain in a really short space of time.
It's dangerous because the gushing water can carry away cars and people.
CATHERINE: Now after a flood has happened, hilly places can drain water away quite quickly, but in flat areas the water sticks around for a really long time and sewerage and dead things can pollute the water and make people sick.
Even when the water does eventually drain away, it leaves behind an mess that's expensive to clean up.
But despite people's losses in north Queensland, many of their thoughts are with the victims of Victoria's bush fires.
PINO GIANDOMENICO, HINCHINBROOK SHIRE MAYOR: We can replace cars and furniture, but you can't replace lives.
RESIDENT: We're bad up here, but not as bad as Victoria. That's horrible, shocking.
JAYNE: We've lost nothing compared to them.
It's been a really tough time for many Australian's, but everyone's doing their bit to try to get people back on their feet.
Presenter Catherine Ellis
external link Queensland floods: ABC News
external link Ingham fears 'massive flood disaster': ABC News
external link Climate Education: Flood: Bureau of Meteorology
Bushfire Disaster
Australia has been shocked by the worst natural disaster in the nation's history. The massive bushfires that ripped through Victoria killed at least 180 people but that number is expected to increase as hundreds of burnt buildings and cars are searched. Thousands of people have also been left without anywhere to live and have lost all their clothes and possessions. The size of the tragedy has shocked people around the world and many are now asking how can a bushfire have caused so much devastation.
Fire Aftermath
For most of us it's hard to imagine what it would be like to lose everything you own let alone your loved ones. But right now there are thousands of people in Victoria who are having to deal with just that. But one thing we've seen in the past couple of weeks is that when things are worst you often see people at their best.
As we've seen over the past few weeks the temperature and the weather can have a huge affect on people's lives so predicting what they'll be in the future is really important. All sorts of people rely on weather forecasts; from Emergency workers to farmers, sailors, pilots, and ordinary people planning the week ahead. But how DO weather forecasters know what will happen in the future? Sarah went to find out.
Fire Investigation
Now the question many people are asking is could the disaster have been prevented and how can we stop it happening again. The government has set up a special inquiry to try to answer those questions and many others.
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