Storm 'to worsen Australia flood'

Flooded Queensland gets more heavy rain
BRISBANE, Australia, Jan. 6 (UPI) -- Heavy Rain fell in Australia's flooded Queensland state Thursday and officials said it could take a year for ravaged towns to recover. Once again, more rain was forecast. Water levels in the worst Flooding in a half century were expected to stay high in many areas for at least one more week, with forecasters predicting Flash Floods in communities this weekend where hundreds of homes are already underwater. At least 10 people have died in weather-related incid...

New storms soak flood-weary Australian communities
BRISBANE, Australia - Cleanup crews toiled under more pounding rains Thursday to clear mountains of debris in flood-ravaged communities across northeastern Australia, as one mayor warned it could take his city up to a year to recover from the worst Flooding in decades. Officials were only beginning to see the scope of the damage as river levels across Queensland state started dropping despite new thunderstorms. Floodwaters were expected to stay high in many areas for at least another week,...

Flooded Australian city faces long wait to dry out
Australia put an army general in charge of flood recovery efforts today after weeks of Heavy Rains deluged the country's northeast, crippling the area's economy, including the Coal Mining industry. Floodwaters have forced most of Queensland state's Coal Mines to shut and some may not restart production for months, ministers said at an emergency Cabinet meeting in Brisbane, the state capital. After the meeting, Queensland Premier Anna Bligh announced that Major General Mick Slater would lead th...

Australian mayor says flood recovery may take a year
A map showing areas in Queensland hit by flood waters. Tens of thousands of... It could take a year for Rockhampton to recover from disastrous floods, the Australian town's mayor said Thursday, as the waters threatened the neighbouring state of New South Wales. "I think that this could drag on for 12 months," Mayor Brad Carter said, adding that it would take three weeks before Rockhampton's airport reopened, even though the floods appeared to have peaked just below the expected level. "It look...

Australian mayor says flood recovery may take a year
It could take a year for Rockhampton to recover from disastrous floods, the Australian town's mayor said Thursday, as the waters threatened the neighbouring state of New South Wales. "I think that this could drag on for 12 months," Mayor Brad Carter said, adding that it would take three weeks before Rockhampton's airport reopened, even though the floods appeared to have peaked just below the expected level. "It looks like it's peaked, it's plateaued and it's showing signs of dropping," he told t...

New storms soak flood-weary Australian communities
BRISBANE, Australia (AP) — Cleanup crews toiled under more pounding rains Thursday to clear mountains of debris in flood-ravaged communities across northeastern Australia, as one mayor warned it could take his city up to a year to recover from the worst Flooding in decades. Officials were only beginning to see the scope of the damage as river levels across Queensland state started dropping despite new thunderstorms. Floodwaters were expected to stay high in many areas for at least another ...

More rain forecast for Queensland
ROCKHAMPTON, Australia, Jan. 5 (UPI) -- Officials say it's too soon to tell whether the worst is over in the in flood-ravaged portions of Queensland in Australia. Driving that concern home, the weather bureau issued a severe weather warning for flood-affected Rockhampton along the Fitzroy River basin, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported Wednesday. Officials said the Fitzroy would peak at 31 feet, but hydrologist Paul Birch said the river has hung around the 30-foot mark since Tuesday. Off...

Heavy rains hit Australia's flood-drenched northeast
Heavy rains threatened further Flooding in Australia's drenched northeast Thursday as besieged Rockhampton cut supplies to "irresponsible" residents who refused to leave water-bound homes. Torrential downpours could cause flash-flooding and worsen existing floods, the weather bureau said, as water levels slowly started to recede in regional centre Rockhampton, a town virtually surrounded by a brown inland sea. Australia's coal-mining and farming belt near Brisbane is suffering "biblical" floods ...

Heavy rains hit Australia's flood-drenched northeast
Heavy rains brought more misery to Australia's flooded northeast Thursday as besieged Rockhampton cut supplies to "irresponsible" residents who refused to leave their water-bound homes. Torrential downpours could cause flash-flooding and worsen existing floods, the weather bureau said, as water levels slowly started to recede in regional centre Rockhampton, a town virtually surrounded by a brown inland sea. Australia's coal-mining and farming belt near Brisbane is suffering "biblical" floods acr...

Residents of flooded Australian city face long recovery
BRISBANE, Australia (AP) — Floodwaters in an inundated city on Australia's coast held steady below their predicted peak on Wednesday, as exhausted residents were warned they would face a long wait before the churning, muddy mess dries up. Residents of the waterlogged city of Rockhampton were hopeful the river had swelled to its highest level, with the mayor saying the community appeared to have been spared any further damage. Water from the overflowing Fitzroy River has already swamped 20...

Australian floods spread, threaten Barrier Reef
Stumble This! Australia's disastrous floods have spread to 40 towns and are threatening the world-famous Great Barrier Reef as tonnes of sludge pour into the sea, officials and scientists said Wednesday. As anxious residents scrambled to build emergency levees and authorities counted billions of dollars in economic damage, researchers said the iconic reef's corals could be damaged by run-off from Australia's eastern coast. James Cook University researcher Michelle Devlin said floodwaters carryi...

Australian floods spread, threaten Barrier Reef
Australia's disastrous floods have spread to 40 towns and are threatening the world-famous Great Barrier Reef as tonnes of sludge pour into the sea, officials and scientists said Wednesday. As anxious residents scrambled to build emergency levees and authorities counted billions of US dollars in economic damage, researchers said the iconic reef's corals could be damaged by run-off from Australia's eastern coast. James Cook University researcher Michelle Devlin said floodwaters carrying debris an...

Australia floods: new storms hit flood region
Heavy rains fell in eastern Australia on Thursday, bringing fresh misery to flood-hit communities as the mayor of the flooded city of Rockhampton warned it could take up to a year to recover from the worst Flooding in decades....

Australia floods cause 'catastrophic' damage
ROCKHAMPTON, Australia -- Australia's record floods are causing catastrophic damage to infrastructure in the state of Queensland and have forced 75 percent of its Coal Mines, which fuel Asia's steel mills, to grind to a halt, Queensland's premier said on Wednesday. The worst Flooding in decades has affected an area the size of Germany and France, leaving towns virtual islands in a muddy inland sea, devastated crops, cut major rail and road links to coal ports, slashed exports and forced up world...

No Aquatic Mad Max in Australia
Writing in spiked, Tim Black contrasts the coverage of the Queensland floods with the actual conditions on the ground: as the coverage of Queensland's misfortune has unfolded, the hype and fear-stoking has increased: the number of people in need of Evacuation is supposedly in the thousands; myriad unscrupulous looting types are waiting in the watery wings; saltwater crocodiles have supposedly been sighted making their way into Rockhampton; and, as a headline in the UK's Daily Telegraph declared...

Australia flood death toll rises
Reporting from Sydney, Australia — Floodwaters in Australia's Queensland state created havoc in at least 22 cities and towns throughout the region grappling with several weeks of devastating rains, officials said Monday. At least three people have been killed in the Flooding since Saturday, and Queensland officials said as many as 10 have died in weather-related incidents beginning in late November. About 200,000 people have been affected by the flooding, with many leaving their homes ...

Australia floods cause 'catastrophic' damage
Australia's record floods are causing catastrophic damage to infrastructure in the state of Queensland and have forced 75 percent of its Coal Mines — which fuel Asia's steel mills — to grind to a halt, Queensland's premier said Wednesday. The worst Flooding in decades has affected an area the size of Germany and France, left towns virtual islands in a muddy inland sea, devastated crops, cut major rail and road links to coal ports, slashed exports and forced up world coal prices. Ar...

Australians Watch, And Wait, For Flooding To Recede
The worst Flooding to hit Australia in a half-century appeared to have peaked in the country's northeast on Wednesday, but residents of one coastal city were warned that it may be weeks before the waters recede. The mayor of Rockhampton, the last major town inundated by the slow-moving flood in Queensland state, said the city appeared to have been spared any further damage as the chocolate-brown floodwaters were holding below their predicted peak. The Fitzroy River, which flows through Rockhampt...

Australian flood-hit towns scramble to build levees
Hundreds of Australians scrambled in the rain to build levee banks and evacuate Hospital patients Wednesday as floods that have inundated or cut off 40 towns rolled downstream. Residents of St. George, which has a history of heavy floods, flew out nursing home patients and set up a temporary Hospital as waters rose in what Queensland's Top Official called a disaster "without precedent". "Everyone is pitching in, doing what they can do," said Senator Barnaby Joyce, who lives in the town. "As soon...

Asian shares fall after weak Wall Street finish
Asian shares mostly fell in early trading Friday after the Dow Jones industrial average turned negative for the first time this year. Japan's Nikkei 225 stock average slipped 0.1 percent to 10,516.61 as investors took profits after the index hit an eight-month closing high the previous day. South Korea's Kospi was off 0.1 percent to 10,517.44, and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.3 percent to 4,708.70. Concerns about the financial impact of the floods in northeastern Australia continued to dra...

Australia flood death toll rises; rains cause more havoc
Reporting from Sydney, Australia — Floodwaters in Australia's Queensland state created havoc in at least 22 cities and towns throughout the region grappling with several weeks of devastating rains, officials said Monday. At least three people have been killed in the Flooding since Saturday, and Queensland officials said as many as 10 have died in weather-related incidents beginning in late November. Get dispatches from Times correspondents around the globe delivered to your inbox with ...

Global climate: Tough little girl
EL NIÑO, a periodic sloshing of warm water from west to east across the Pacific, gets its name—“the boy child”—because it is around Christmas that it warms the water off Peru. It is now understood to have far wider effects, leading to characteristic patterns of temperature, rainfall and drought around much of the world. El Niño’s female counterpart, La Niña—a cooler sloshing from east to west—is less well known, and less frequent. But it t...

Australia floods cause "catastrophic" damage
By Daniel Munoz ROCKHAMPTON, Australia | Tue Jan 4, 2011 9:24pm EST ROCKHAMPTON, Australia (Reuters) - Australia's record floods are causing catastrophic damage to infrastructure in the state of Queensland and have forced 75 percent of its Coal Mines, which fuel Asia's steel mills, to grind to a halt, Queensland's premier said on Wednesday. The worst Flooding in decades has affected an area the size of Germany and France, left towns virtual islands in a muddy inland sea, cut major rail and ro...

Snakes, crocodiles threaten flood-hit Australia town
Australian residents fled their homes and sandbagged properties Tuesday as a major town was threatened by a worsening flood disaster which unleashed a plague of snakes and crocodiles. Tens of thousands of people in Rockhampton braced for complete isolation as waters which have inundated an area bigger than France and Germany, and closed the town's airport and railway, lapped at the last remaining road link. Rumours of crocodile sightings swept the besieged cattle-farming centre northeast of Bris...

Australia Flooding Creates Global Ripple Effect
Queensland Treasurer Andrew Fraser has called the recent Flooding in Australia a "disaster of biblical proportion." Flood waters have covered an area larger than the state of Texas. The Flooding is also having a global impact on wheat and coal prices. The severe Flooding has turned the city of Rockhampton's streets into raging rivers. "What's happening here in Rockhampton is - well, I don't think we're going to see it again for another 50 or 100 years," said Anna Bligh, Queensland State Premi...