Lonely vigil. Brisbane Flood 2022.
I forgot to put this on private while I added descriptions. Sorry about that, you can soon go back and read about each shot.
It's about high tide on the morning of Monday 28 February 2022 and this volunteer overlooks a street in south side Hawthorne, Brisbane, beside the raging Brisbane River which has spilled into surrounding streets. Despite being so close to the river down the end of the street, you can just see a City Cat ferry tied up and being hammered by the river and its debris in the distance, the street is quiet. People are just waiting for the high tide to pass, some are pumping water from their ground floors but this water won't be going anywhere until the tide drops. And then it will return twice a day until flood levels drop a bit later this week. Then the mud army (ordinary people, volunteering to clean up) will move in, as they have done before and already done in some streets in the 140 affected suburbs. 15000+ homes many flooded to their roofs will need extensive help cleaning out. Peoples' their lives and stinking mud will be dumped on the footpath to be carted away. Many were not so badly impacted as in the last big flood in 2011, but for many, it is sadly deja vue and for others, much worse. If you were affected by rain run off and swollen creeks the clean up has already begun, if you are affected by the river and its tributaries you will wait days, of high tides pushing the flood back and invading your home until the flood level recedes.
These are just a few shots we took yesterday. For many and technically, the water level was officially lower than 2011 but for many, it has been worse because of the sheer amount of rain that fell. Authorities have called it a "water bomb". I worked in the last two major floods in 1974 and 2011 and saw very little of the utter devastation at the time. In only 11 years, it has been inflicted on our beautiful city once again. And the whole of South East Queensland and northern New South Wales. No-one saw this coming, nor how bad and fast it would be. No-one was prepared. Eight dead last night just locally, our dams full, Wivenhoe, our largest was getting close to water restrictions but in just two days went from 58 to 188% capacity (it is a drinking water and flood mitigation dam). The Brisbane River has not only inflicted such trauma on the city through flooding, but as usual, it has released barges, boats, pontoons, a City Cat, house boats and millions of tonnes of household and industrial detritus like a volley of shots downstream at high speed. Many of these have had to be rescued and saved or just saved from smashing into other things like bridges, other boats etc. A barge with a massive crane building a new bridge in the city was close to collapsing or floating away yesterday, a City Cat got loose overnight and shot downstream and eventually hit a cargo ship in the Port before it was secured. A whole shopping centre (mall) at Toombul, which despite being adjacent to Kedron Brook has never gone under since it opened in 1967 was wiped out. And the list goes on and on and that says nothing about the cities north and south of Brisbane. Gympie experienced the worst flood since 1890 and Maryborough downstream just got over its most devastating flood in January to go under again. And many people can no longer get insurance in flood prone areas. Goodness knows how they will rebuild their lives.
This is just a quick peek as I said. There are four main thoroughfares into the city from our home on the north side. Yesterday morning, only one was not flooded. Wherever we went, we found flood waters in front of us and had to turn away and find another route. I have not tried to take photos of flooded homes or people cleaning up looking devastated and traumatised. I have those people just down the road and that is far too intrusive. It was easy travelling about yesterday, all schools were shut, all public transport stopped (none could get into the city anyway), people couldn't get to work so business remained closed just like another lockdown.
I have disabled comments on all the shots except this one.
With climate change, we know this type of disaster will become more common. Sadly.
And we say thanks to the emergency workers, the State Emergency Service, the police, the firemen, the paramedics and the volunteers, the Mud Army. The will don their gumboots and gloves and give selflessly of their labour, moving, sweeping and swilling out. Thank God that we still have goodness in this world. They will all be even more sorely needed as the week unfolds and we see the sad remnants of lives and livelihoods.
Lonely vigil. Brisbane Flood 2022.
I forgot to put this on private while I added descriptions. Sorry about that, you can soon go back and read about each shot.
It's about high tide on the morning of Monday 28 February 2022 and this volunteer overlooks a street in south side Hawthorne, Brisbane, beside the raging Brisbane River which has spilled into surrounding streets. Despite being so close to the river down the end of the street, you can just see a City Cat ferry tied up and being hammered by the river and its debris in the distance, the street is quiet. People are just waiting for the high tide to pass, some are pumping water from their ground floors but this water won't be going anywhere until the tide drops. And then it will return twice a day until flood levels drop a bit later this week. Then the mud army (ordinary people, volunteering to clean up) will move in, as they have done before and already done in some streets in the 140 affected suburbs. 15000+ homes many flooded to their roofs will need extensive help cleaning out. Peoples' their lives and stinking mud will be dumped on the footpath to be carted away. Many were not so badly impacted as in the last big flood in 2011, but for many, it is sadly deja vue and for others, much worse. If you were affected by rain run off and swollen creeks the clean up has already begun, if you are affected by the river and its tributaries you will wait days, of high tides pushing the flood back and invading your home until the flood level recedes.
These are just a few shots we took yesterday. For many and technically, the water level was officially lower than 2011 but for many, it has been worse because of the sheer amount of rain that fell. Authorities have called it a "water bomb". I worked in the last two major floods in 1974 and 2011 and saw very little of the utter devastation at the time. In only 11 years, it has been inflicted on our beautiful city once again. And the whole of South East Queensland and northern New South Wales. No-one saw this coming, nor how bad and fast it would be. No-one was prepared. Eight dead last night just locally, our dams full, Wivenhoe, our largest was getting close to water restrictions but in just two days went from 58 to 188% capacity (it is a drinking water and flood mitigation dam). The Brisbane River has not only inflicted such trauma on the city through flooding, but as usual, it has released barges, boats, pontoons, a City Cat, house boats and millions of tonnes of household and industrial detritus like a volley of shots downstream at high speed. Many of these have had to be rescued and saved or just saved from smashing into other things like bridges, other boats etc. A barge with a massive crane building a new bridge in the city was close to collapsing or floating away yesterday, a City Cat got loose overnight and shot downstream and eventually hit a cargo ship in the Port before it was secured. A whole shopping centre (mall) at Toombul, which despite being adjacent to Kedron Brook has never gone under since it opened in 1967 was wiped out. And the list goes on and on and that says nothing about the cities north and south of Brisbane. Gympie experienced the worst flood since 1890 and Maryborough downstream just got over its most devastating flood in January to go under again. And many people can no longer get insurance in flood prone areas. Goodness knows how they will rebuild their lives.
This is just a quick peek as I said. There are four main thoroughfares into the city from our home on the north side. Yesterday morning, only one was not flooded. Wherever we went, we found flood waters in front of us and had to turn away and find another route. I have not tried to take photos of flooded homes or people cleaning up looking devastated and traumatised. I have those people just down the road and that is far too intrusive. It was easy travelling about yesterday, all schools were shut, all public transport stopped (none could get into the city anyway), people couldn't get to work so business remained closed just like another lockdown.
I have disabled comments on all the shots except this one.
With climate change, we know this type of disaster will become more common. Sadly.
And we say thanks to the emergency workers, the State Emergency Service, the police, the firemen, the paramedics and the volunteers, the Mud Army. The will don their gumboots and gloves and give selflessly of their labour, moving, sweeping and swilling out. Thank God that we still have goodness in this world. They will all be even more sorely needed as the week unfolds and we see the sad remnants of lives and livelihoods.