Major flooding across far north Queensland

Australian Community Media

Severe weather warning for flood-affected far north Queensland as cyclonic storms, rainfall continues.

Transcript

00:00Major and dangerous flooding impacting parts of northeast Queensland, bringing

00:05inundation to homes, properties and businesses and lots more is on the way.

00:10We can see what's driving this with the radar over the last 12 hours.

00:14Widespread rain and thunderstorm activity from pretty much the Mackay

00:18region and Whitsundays all the way to the Herbert and Lower Burdekin,

00:21Townsville and then up into southern parts of the north tropical coast. But of

00:25particular concern is the area between Cardwell and Eyre, where this region has

00:30seen widespread 200 to 400 millimetres in the 24 hours to 9 o'clock this

00:36morning, with some isolated locations just to the west of Townsville seeing

00:40700 millimetres. And with more rain on the way, severe weather warnings are

00:45current for heavy to locally intense rainfall that could lead to dangerous

00:49and life-threatening flash flooding, as well as damaging winds, particularly for

00:54our coastal locations and offshore islands. So what this means, if you live

00:58in this highlighted area, further rainfall will likely lead to an

01:01exacerbation and further increases on our rivers, creeks and streams and

01:05damaging winds could bring down trees and power lines in our coastal

01:09communities, where we've already seen flooding impacts. And because of that and

01:13all this rainfall, flood warnings are current for a number of our rivers and

01:18catchment areas. Of most concern though are our major flood warnings, which are

01:22current for the Herbert River, that includes the towns of Ingham and

01:26Halifax, where Ingham could see a flood equal to that of March 1967, approaching

01:32a record flood level there. We've also got major flooding on the Ross, the Bollie

01:37and the Horton rivers around Townsville, and further rainfall likely to see

01:41increases on those as well. We do have moderate flood warnings on the Murray

01:45and the Tully rivers, they could also likely increase depending on further

01:49rainfall and a number of minor flood warnings and flood watches are also

01:53current. But what's driving all this rainfall and will continue to do so, is

01:57we've got a shear zone and low pressure system just continuing to hang off the

02:01north tropical coast and as you can see here we're getting very moist and

02:04tropical air coming down from the north and also coming in from the east as well

02:09and that's converging on our area between Cardwell and Eyre, just leading

02:13to this prolonged period of heavy rainfall that is leading to our major

02:17flood impacts. And unfortunately as we get through Monday morning and into

02:21Tuesday, notice this feed of moisture and convergence continues around that

02:25Cardwell Eyre area, as this low kind of continues to linger off the coast of

02:30Queensland. And this also sees widespread rain and storms spread through much of

02:34inland Queensland as well. And now look at our rainfall totals in the next 36

02:39hours, this is why we're so concerned for our residents and communities between

02:43Ingham and Eyre. We've already seen 500 to 800 millimetres in some locations

02:48approaching one metre in the last 48 hours and we could see an

02:53additional 300 or more in these black highlighted areas, with isolated totals

02:57in excess of 500 millimetres possible on top of what we've already seen. Those

03:02totals will be isolated but we're still likely to see widespread, as you can see

03:06here, 1 to 200 millimetres with falls in excess of 300 millimetres. So again our

03:12flood scenario will continue to evolve as we move through today and tonight and

03:16we're likely to see major to record flooding occur on some of our rivers. So

03:20please stay up to date with the latest forecasts and warnings via our website

03:24and app and listen to all and any advice from emergency services in the coming

03:30hours and days.

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