Tropical Cyclone Alfred is driving wet and windy weather over south-east Queensland and northern NSW.
Cyclone Alfred is hours away from landfall in south-east Queensland, as the state braces for destructive winds and heavy rainfall.
The effects are already being felt there, with rising floodwaters and rough seas battering the coastline. More than 80,000 homes and businesses across both states are without power - that could last for days.
The category two system is currently around 80 kilometres east of the Gold Coast.
It's expected to cross land late on Friday evening or early Saturday morning, downgrading to a category one as it does.
Gusts and torrential rain have caused widespread power outages and triggered flash floods in parts of Australia's east coast, with one person killed and a dozen soldiers wounded.
After days hovering off the coast as a Category 2 tropical cyclone and battering a 400km (250-mile) stretch of coastline, Alfred significantly weakened on Sunday, but still left significant disturbance along its path.
Some 316,540 people were without power as of Sunday in Queensland's southeast, where the Gold Coast city was the worst-hit area, energy distributor Energex said in a statement.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Sunday that the "situation in Queensland and northern New South Wales remains very serious due to flash flooding and heavy winds".
"Heavy rainfall, damaging wind gusts, and coastal surf impacts are expected to continue over coming days," Albanese said in Canberra.
In Queensland's Hervey Bay, more than 230mm (9 inches) of rain was recorded in just six hours on Sunday morning, according to State Premier David Crisafulli.
"We've seen that culminate in reports of flash flooding in homes and in businesses," Crisafulli was quoted as saying by the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper.
News.com.au reported that emergency services in Hervey Bay have carried out multiple rescues "in one of its worst weather emergencies on record" in the area.
Australia's Bureau of Meteorology said heavy rainfall that could cause flash flooding was developing on Sunday and could affect Brisbane as well as the Queensland regional centres of Ipswich, Sunshine Coast and Gympie.
Damaging winds with gusts of about 90km/h (60mph) were also possible in the state, the bureau said on its website.
Brisbane airport reopened on Sunday but posted on X that "ongoing weather may affect the schedule".
Queensland will decide later on Sunday whether about 1,000 state schools, closed due to the bad weather, will reopen on Monday.
The neighbouring state of New South Wales (NSW) has confirmed all public schools that were closed on Friday due to Alfred will remain closed again on Monday.
On Saturday, one man died in a flood in northern NSW.
Meanwhile, 13 Australian Defence Force soldiers en route to help residents in NSW's city of Lismore were injured in a road collision, officials said. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, two of the soldiers remain in serious condition.
Alfred is the first cyclone to cross the east Australian coast near the Queensland state capital of Brisbane since 1974.
Another crock of shit media clickbait scaremongering. I live in Brisbane and yes the Gold Coast and a couple of suburbs got hit with a few trees down and a few power cuts, the Majority of the evening had moderate winds with moderate rainfall. The way the Media has been on about it you would be thinking it was end days.. I am currently looking out my window and observing that it is still raining softly with the gumtrees moving gently! Like Come on! Its was only a Cat 2 down to a cat 1 now its only a Tropical low still hanging around Brisbane. FFS!
Oldfart It wasn't a "crock of shit". I noticed you posted this 2 days ago. Care to comment now, or will you just go into hiding because the wind damage and massive rainfall since then has proved you wrong? At one point, there were about 400,000 homes without power, the most at any one time in Queensland's history. There are still 200,000 homes with now power as of 10th March. Many suburbs recorded 500mm+ rainfall in 24 hours, and the highest total in the Gold Coast Hinterland was 1100mm. Alfred might have been "downgraded" as it crossed the cost, but there were still gale-force winds that brought down power lines in many places during Saturday. There was no "scaremongering" the way you described it. It was a once-in-50-years event, and the last time a cyclone crossed the coast near Brisbane, the population was a tiny fraction of what it is now, so OF COURSE multiple warnings were issued, and than goodness they were otherwise damage would have been MUCH worse!
Yeah, I live all the way down the NSW coast west of Port Maquarie and all we had is rain and a bit of wind - and the idiots closed down our Community Center because of the weather. Just like the 'plandemic', fear drives much of their decisions.
We have got localised flooding going on around Brisbane at the moment.. We got nothing hardly from the Cyclone but we seem to be copping a fair bit of rain at the moment. The media though is having us believe its end days sort of shit.
Oldfart I've got a mate that lives in Surfers Paradise, he's kept me advised of what is going on up there (washed out beaches, etc). I've had my wood stove on for the last four days, just enough to keep the place warm and DRY. This morning a lady I know admitted she finally put her wood stove on as she found mold forming on her cabinets. My mate up in 'Goldie' doesn't have a wood stove and is waiting for a nice dry day to open all his windows - he also has mold forming inside.
No big panic from the cyclone, just maintenance of the property. His big gum tree has withstood the wind, but he has several other smaller trees go down. He's waiting for that dry day to go out and cut them up.
Oldfart Ok, so I see you did have the decency to return and make a comment. Be grateful you still have power, many people won't get their power back for another week!
Third_Density_Learner More like 3rd density drop kick! Go take a jump! Some parts copped it but I live in the SW of Brisbane and we didn't get anything serious. As did the majority of Brisbane.. Pray tell what area do you live in? The media beat this up with Crisafuli on the TV every 30 minutes.. Try living in Northern QLD where they experience cat 4 and 5 cyclone's every year.. It was only a cat 1 tropical low for SE qld.. Big deal! Northern Queenslanders are laughing at SE QLD at the moment because we copped a bit of rain and whoopie 100 kph winds! Someone throws a cup of tea out the window in SE qld and its a major media event. The Sunshine coast and the Gold Coast are known storm magnets. If there is any kind of shit happening they are the first and worst to cop it. It happens all the time. Every year!
Third_Density_Learner "Ok, so I see you did have the decency to return and make a comment." - I made that comment hours before you showed up. What's going on in your head mate?
Spur I just missed it, an easy mistake to make. We aren't all perfect like you, but at least I don't write off objectively significant weather phenomena as fizzers. What is going on in YOUR head to do such a thing?
Last night at 5:30 the power went out, came back on a couple of times as they tried to re-set the breakers, then nothing. I figured they had a hard fault and it would be hours or more before the power was back on.
I keep several kerosene lanterns available and lit one before going to bed. That way the wife can find the loo in the night. You can't get kerosene lanterns anymore, go ahead try and find one in a hardware or camping store - nothing for sale except re-chargeable electrical lights. It appears that it is part of the global warming/climate change/net zero bullshit. If you are out and about and see a second hand store, check and see if they still have a kerosene lantern for sale. They are stone cold reliable and should be a necessary item to have on hand for times like this.
Oh dear, there absolutely was NOT "manipulation" of the cyclone! If you think its sudden turn to the west was "manipulation", it just tells me you don't understand basic meteorology. Cyclones are subject to various steering mechanisms, and there was agreatbig ridge of high pressure that developed to the east of thecycloneas it moved south. These ridges are not at all uncommon, and have theeffectof pushingtroughs andlows westwards towards thecoast. They have beenoccurringfor eons.
Third_Density_Learner I posted the link to the article for people to consider. That's what we tend to do on this forum, exchange ideas. I'm glad that self righteous, morally superior people like yourself add extra content.
Spur Oh yes, a North Queenslander who is very experienced with cyclones and therefore more prepared. It's like comparing apple to oranges, and is extremely disingenuous. Alfred affected 10 times more people than Cairns and Townsville combined, dropped 500mm+ of rain in many locations, and caused 400,000 homes to lose power. That should be significant by anyone's standards.
interesting discussion - couldn't help but weigh in having been through about a dozen cyclones including Larry and Yasi (both cat 5's). Yes, there is a LOT of media fear mongering that goes on in Aust. and yes, people in the north learn fast after you go through the first one, that you must do a series of things to prepare every single wet season. Even if there are no cyclones in a season, the monsoon trough will still cause flooding and close the transport routes so you can't get out to buy supplies.
Every storm is different and its impacts on individual neighbourhoods can be quite varied.
BUT there IS manipulation going on here in Aust and I'm still trying to figure out why that area was targeted. (perhaps a warning to the new Crisafulli govt not to make too many changes to the current rotten rules??) Watched Alfred on the sat for days - it was a weird one with only half a normal cloud field - and then doing the U-turn when it got off SEQ. According to the wind shear maps, it was entirely in a bad sheer area the whole time and shouldn't have even existed.
Basically, I suspect SEQ/No NSW just had a repeat of what happened with ex-Jasper in the far north in Dec 2023. All models had the cat 1/2 storm moving through the bottom of the Cape in 48 hours but it was 'stalled' right off the coast of Cooktown when it was barely cat 1 for a couple days; then SAI was used to really maximise the rainfall to unseen levels including areas that were no where near where the cyclone had passed. It caused so much damage up north that some of the main transit roads are STILL not repaired.
IMHO, it is not the cyclone - it is the EXCUSE the cyclone provides for somebody to f*ck around with the rainfall levels to deliberately flood places out.
I sympathise with everyone who has lost stuff from Alfred and the disruption it has caused. But it is perhaps a silver lining to that cloud to see the pollies having to deal with this right on their doorsteps. They usually stand behind the podium and offer platitudes and a bit of pocket money to those affected by extreme weather events which are so common in the north.
Sometimes people hold a core belief that is very strong. When they are presented with evidence that works against that belief, the new evidence cannot be accepted. It would create a feeling that is extremely uncomfortable, called cognitive dissonance. And because it is so important to protect the core belief, they will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn't fit in with the core belief.
- Frantz Fanon
”
Recent Comments
Dr Leana Wen is the most disgusting piece of dung that ever commented about the kung-flu during the kabuki-years. I just hope that she chokes on...
Comment: Update March 9
Al Jazeera reports: