Hundreds of people evacuated due to flood disaster in northeastern Australia
Residents took shelter on the roof of a hospital as Australia’s north-east was hit by floods that occur repeatedly each month, with raging waters cutting off roads and sending crocodiles into towns.
Police said rescue teams evacuated more than 300 people overnight and sent military helicopters to help areas isolated by floods.
Damage was reported along the coast extending about 400 kilometers (250 mi) north of Queensland state.
Cassie Hounslow, the resort’s manager, said entire homes were submerged in Mossman, a small town at the foot of the Heritage of Humanity-declared Daintree Tropical Forest.
“Homes have been destroyed,” AFP said. Some houses have been completely submerged.”
Wheel corners “destroyed one of the roads” due to a landslide, Hounslow said, and an important road that Mossman was selling was “practically ruined”.
As fears of another flood loomed on Monday, Queensland’s Treasurer, Cameron Dick, said the developing disaster would have “hundreds of millions of dollars of impact” in the state.
‘Mar off bar’
Nine people, including a seven-year-old patient, had gathered during the night to save themselves on the roof of a hospital in the predominantly tribal township of Vujal Vujal.
“We understand that these people are desperate now,” said Kylie Hanslow, executive director of the Council of Comarca Aborigines Wujal Wujal.
Police said the group moved to a safe place before the tide changed and the moon rose in the evening.
The county council said it had to abandon efforts to rescue people who had fallen into the city.
“Unfortunately the helicopters did not pass through… it was too dangerous to pass through,” the council said in a statement on social networks.
“I will try to return to the market as soon as possible.”
Surrounded by interior mountainous tropical forest, the inaccessible Wujal Wujal is one of the most inhospitable areas of Australia.
Hanslow told national broadcaster ABC that the town, which usually houses about 300 people, was a “sea of dried water and mud”.
“Now even crocodiles are swimming in that water,” he said.
Queensland Police Commissioner Katrina Carroll said flooding would potentially draw “crocodiles and all sorts of other things” into residential areas.
“Recording that in previous events we had Tiburon, crocodiles, seas,” the journalists said.
Wildlife agents in the rural town of Ingham used a lasso to capture an alligator swimming in shallow water near homes.
‘Low level’ rainfall
Queensland has been inundated by southerly winds and torrential rains caused by Tropical Cyclone Jasper, which flooded the Coral Sea late last week.
The tourist center of Cairns has been almost completely engulfed by floods, destroying main roads leading to the city of 150,000 residents.
Locals used ropes to rescue cattle trapped in torrential rain on the outskirts of Cairns.
Stalled water splashed over the sides of planes parked at Cairns International Airport.
“This level of rainfall is the next one,” Queensland Premier Steven Miles told reporters on Monday.
“Let us deploy virtually all the boats that we managed to get to Cairns to evacuate those who could not do it themselves.”
Miles said officials were becoming concerned about dwindling supplies of drinking water, and he urged people to conserve “as much as possible.”
The Australian military used two heavy-lift Chinook helicopters to deliver supplies and personnel to flooded cities.
Police Commissioner Carroll said officials were pleased that no deaths or graves had been observed during the emergency up to that point.
Researchers have repeatedly warned that climate change increases the risk of natural disasters such as wildfires, floods and cyclones.
