News from Brisbane (at last!)

Well, just in case you have missed the blog updates since March (no, there haven't been any) I have to tell you that Rene and I are selling our home here in Brisbane and emigrating back to The Netherlands.

We've sold to a Dutch couple (ironic!) from The Hague, which is exactly the city we are moving to at the end of January. We settle here on December 16 then go on a South Pacific holiday and finally depart Brisbane for Europe on January 28.

Rene sold the house himself privately, without an agent, and he feels rightly chuffed about it. It is a beautiful home, and I shall miss it, but we are planning on buying in Den Haag around March next year.

I finish up my job on Dec 2 and I had my last meeting with my network today and they gave me a farewell gift and said lovely things about me (all true haha!).

We still have lots of things happening and loads of quotes to get and bureaucracy to deal with (oh the bureaucracy!).

We will keep our apartment here on the Sunshine Coast (it's already rented permanently) and of course visit often. Tickets to Australia from Europe are considerably less expensive than those bought in Australia heading to Europe. Why is that?

What with removalists to arrange, work to close up, packing to proceed with and of course the Garage Sale of the Century, we have lots to keep us distracted. We are taking our furniture, much of it bespoke, because the last time we left most of it in Nederlands and sold it off or gave it away and it cost a fortune to buy again here.

That's all for now - I plan on picking up relief teacher work in The Hague at my old school and Rene will be looking to get back into his old field of water management and dredging. Last week the UN released a list of the top countries in the world using criteria such as incomes, health, life expectancy, education, happiness etc, and #1 was Norway, a close 2nd was Australia and...3rd was The Netherlands. I might be surrendering the sun, but I am not moving to a difficult country to live in. I'll have to learn better Dutch and also gain a Dutch driving licence after 186 days. I'm sure I can do all that - even learn to be more confident on a bicycle in narrow streets.

More to come later, now that I've resumed after so long. I'm slightly apprehensive about all the things that I/we have to do in the coming weeks, but I'm also excited to be having a change and moving back to the country where I shed a tear or three upon leaving last time two years ago.

Oh, I have a cousin from London arriving around Christmas so we'll have some fun then and welcome Rachel and her family to Brisbane and Queensland, which will always be my spiritual home.

Do I have to dwell on the disasters du jour?

2011 has not been a very good year to date.

That's called 'understatement'.

It has been an appalling year thus far, with all sorts of natural disasters impacting on my psyche.

It began with rain - loads of the bloody stuff! As I type this Saturday afternoon it is raining yet again, but in some parts of northern Australia it has not really stopped for months! They're measuring it in metres now, and even the hardened folk who are used to living in the Tropics have been saying, "enough's enough!"

Prince William is touring devastated communities this very moment; giving some media attention to the plight of these poor people BUT when you compare disasters, SO many people in many, many places are suffering and enduring unbearable losses and challenges YET one knows that most will overcome this setback and rebuild, as humankind has done since time began.

Japan is huge in my mind at present simply because of the enormity and complexity of the devastation. But we have had Christchurch suffering another, even more powerful, earthquake (6.3) that has made the one from last year (7.1) seem almost inconsequential. Having just come back from there, I felt incredibly connected and concerned - almost as if it had happened here in Australia. We've had communities in our beautiful state of Queensland still not yet able to rebuild after a cyclone and flooding, and yet even more incessant deluges from the heavens. The inland tsunami that wrecked the Lockyer Valley communities just west of us here on the very day we returned from Christchurch was appalling, yet the vision from Japan a week ago was even more horrifying, creating even more cataclysmic chaos on a scale I have never seen before.

This picture (above) epitomises the current situation in Japan. There are thousands of images from Japan in the last week that I could have placed here, but this child - arms up in the air as if surrendering - sums up the helplessness of the population at large around Sendai in the north.

I have reduced confidence in Japanese institutions like TEPCO to handle the truth, the whole truth and nothing but... This is why everybody of note in international organisations are in Japan now seeing first hand what is happening regarding the atomic power station because these institutions have been found out on many previous occasions fabricating results or just plainly misleading both regulatory authorities and government. Even the Japanese PM has been frustrated about hearing of developments through the media and not directly from the company. It stands at Level 5 (equal to Three Mile Island) - let's hope the number doesn't go higher.

(from Bloomberg March 18)

Accurate and timely information from Tokyo Electric Power Co. about the accident at its nuclear plant in northern Japan has been hard to come by.

About 60 reporters at a March 16 briefing with utility officials wanted to know whether helicopters would dump seawater on reactors at the Dai-Ichi station to prevent a meltdown. The company was considering the plan, said Masahisa Otsuki, head of the nuclear maintenance division.

At the same time, a live broadcast on a nearby TV screen showed a helicopter taking off with a massive bucket of water hanging from its belly. Reporters barraged the officials.

“We are sorry,” a spokesman said. “We need to check on this.”

Prime Minister Naoto Kan was so frustrated March 15 by a delay in informing him of a fire in reactor No. 1 that he asked utility officials, “What the hell is going on?,” several news agencies reported.

Neighboring China, worried about the spread of radiation from damaged reactors, urged Japan to keep the world fully informed of its efforts and to provide timely and accurate information, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said.

‘Confusing Situation’
“It’s a confusing situation, and we’re not getting consistent reports out of Japan,” said Gerry Thomas, professor of molecular pathology at London’s Imperial College who has studied the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster. “There is an awful lot of misinformation, I think, being put out.”

On March 16, spokesmen for Asia’s biggest utility, also known as Tepco, appeared to indicate that the containment vessel of reactor No. 3 was breached, citing a fire and a surge in radiation as evidence. They later backtracked after no breach was found.

They also told reporters that smoke was coming out of reactor No. 4, then later corrected that to reactor No. 3.

My thoughts are with those hundreds of thousands of displaced Japanese who have to stay and call it 'home'. Last I saw it was snowing and -2C and people were hungry and cold. I think I'm taking on too much writing about their plight...

(Picture above of a petrol tanker caught on a windy road heading towards Lyttleton during the Christchurch earthquake - note the change in the roadway's edge - the driver couldn't go forwards or backwards.)

A few thoughts about Christchurch: New Zealand feels like family to me; like those cousins you rarely see but are aware of what they are doing even if you don't chat all that often (much less visit). The once grand city of Christchurch was severely damaged with a third of its CBD to be demolished and a sixth of its population of 360 000 already departed, maybe never to return. The whole Canterbury Region is also affected thus spreading the pain, and everyone here in Australia has a Kiwi connection of some kind thus making this disaster more personal. The senior high school geography lesson that mentioned 'liquefaction' is a distant memory, but on February 22nd streets in the city turned to grey, sandy mush - and water flooded homes and businesses, in some cases creating whirlpools of unstable soil. There is a possibility that some areas of suburban Christchurch (even the CBD) may not be able to be rebuilt on. (definition of liquefaction is at the end of this entry for those who - like myself - have forgotten their schooling from more than 40 years ago).

The Roman Catholic Cathedral will be rebuilt and saved. There won't be many others - all are condemned to be demolished - one third of the CBD (central business district).

The landmark Anglican Cathedral in Cathedral Square will also be rebuilt and saved. Rene and I celebrated New Year 2011 in this square just two and a half months ago, and the bells from the once grand spire rang out welcoming the New Year whilst fireworks exploded in the night air. It will do so yet again - just not for a while.

Another geography lesson came to mind during this event. A 30 million tonne iceberg 'calved' from a glacier in NZ. Now there's something you don't see everyday! I think from memory it later rolled further and the blue parts went below the water level. Nature in all its glory.

If you call Sendai home, or Christchurch, let alone Grantham in the Lockyer Valley, your world will never ever be the same again. Yes, here in Brisbane and dozens of Queensland towns, water invaded homes and disrupted lives to an enormous extent yet almost without loss of life. In the three disasters mentioned above tens, hundreds and even thousands of lives have been lost and as a result families will rebuild with grief as a constant companion. My thoughts are with them - I know I am extremely fortunate to be safe.

The picture (above) is a reminder of the volunteer job I have being an Airport Ambassador. During the floods we all helped the Brisbane Airport assist passengers arriving from overseas or departing during a time of upheaval. We have assisted passengers escaping Christchurch by making their progress through the airport a little easier (and always with a smile). We have seen teams of police and emergency crews leaving for North Queensland and New Zealand
and directed overseas people arriving to assist us here. As I saw the vision of Sendai Airport being swamped by the tsunami last week I was reminded of just how valuable an asset an airport is. It is often something people take for granted, but when nursing homes were evacuated from up north during the cyclone, the patients arrived by military aircraft at our civilian airport and were processed in a temporary set of marquees on the edge of the runway. As I directed a passenger this morning to the airport train station directly from her arriving international flight, her comment was, "we don't have a train at Melbourne Airport". Our transport access to Brisbane Airport is first rate now with new roads opened and bottlenecks removed by flyovers etc.

OK, enough gloom! I can tell you a few things we have been doing lately. We have been to see a touring Dutch theatre group in a production of 'Good Cop, Bad Cop' (part of the WTF World Theatre Festival) which was about three animals sharing a home. The three Dutch actors spoke in English, and it used multimedia visuals to do the speaking whilst they were the animals. After ten minutes I understood who was who, but it was a challenge to get into it at first. Very good! So was Lily Tomlin, who we saw on a weeknight as part of the Brisbane Comedy Festival - she began at 9 and finished at 10:50 and at the age of 73 she had lost none of her wit and her insightful humour. I just wish I could remember her one liners - they were brilliant! There were just too many to remember. I saw 'Wicked' at last on Thursday night (it was postponed from the floods and our seats this time were even better than the previous booking). 'Defying Gravity' and 'Popular' were my favourite songs. Excellent in every respect. I went with five of my friends, but Rene stayed home - he hates musicals. His loss...

Last Wednesday evening I went with a friend to see a free preview screening of 'Biutiful' starring Javier Bardem. Very dark and gloomy (quite Spanish) set in a Barcelona I've never visited. Excellent film, but Kit and I needed a damned good laugh afterwards. Phew!

I'm leaving the best news till last. My dear friend Di has had open heart surgery and come away from it quite well. A leaky valve was found to be torn and relatively easily repaired in a 2.5 hour operation instead of a 4 hour one if it had needed replacing. She was home in twelve days and will have to take life easy for around three months. Her husband, Torquil, has taken a month off work and I've taken on two of his three schools for ESL work.

That's about all for now. Four weeks until the end of term and our trip to Auckland. I still can't quite believe how the year has rocketed by; but with work, a busy social life plus the news dominating daily life one can hardly expect it to be any different.

Until next time.

(High school geography revisited - a definition of 'liquefaction')
Liquefaction is the name given to the process that converts a solid soil mass into a liquid.

Liquefaction occurs in cohesionless soils (typically those with a higher content of larger grains such as sand sized clasts) which have water in the pore spaces, and are poorly drained.

When the seismic waves from the earthquake pass through the soil, the vibrations cause the individual grains in the soil to move around and re-adjust their positions. This ultimately results in a decrease in volume of the soil mass as the grains pack more tightly together (a reduction in porosity).

The pore water which was originally in those spaces becomes compressed. Water is relatively incompressible and as such it pushes back against the soil grains (more correctly this is described as an increase in pore water pressure). The pore pressure becomes so high, that the soil grains become almost buoyant causing a significant drop in the shear strength of the soil to a very low value.

When this occurs the soil loses it's ability to support loads (technically described as a loss of bearing capacity) which can cause subsidence of building foundations.

Our recent visit to the South Island NZ

We returned four weeks ago to the news of Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley both experiencing deadly flash flooding. Recounting events of our holiday seemed a trifle unimportant then, and only now do I feel ready to tell about our truly wonderful visit to New Zealand's South Island to celebrate our first wedding anniversary.

It began in Christchurch, the city that experienced the 7.1 magnitude earthquake last September. We concentrated for 12 nights on the lower half of the island driving in a clockwise direction, keeping the most spectacular vistas of the west coast as our finale. The first two nights were spent in a delightful B&B in a vineyard just 20 minutes west of the city. There Robbert (a Dutchman) and his partner Scott looked after us, even providing a lovely dinner on the second evening - our actual wedding anniversary. They also provided a taste of the earthquake with a 4.3 aftershock and a 3.5 a minute later on our last morning there to let us have the merest small taste of what they had experienced for 40 very long seconds. Damned scary!

Lunch on the first day was at the Langdale Vineyard restaurant nearby. They were closed for a private function, but after a while they said they could do up a platter to share. When it arrived I had to take a photo of it. Delicious! Oh, the Langdale Rose was really lovely too, but it actually came from the neighbouring vineyard and had the Langdale name on it.

After lunch we drove to the coast north of Christchurch and found the beaches littered with masses of piled up timber from trees along the two rivers north and south of here that had been in flood the week before. The timber was flushed out to sea then deposited back by subsequent tides. This was the root system of a tree, notice the beautiful stones embedded in the roots as it grew alongside the river.


You can take a punt in Christchurch. The city is very English, as opposed to Dunedin further south which is very Scottish.

It was a bit ghoulish to photograph earthquake damage, so I limited the number, but this was a church near to our hotel - one of many to be repaired later. Lots of cleared building sites were in evidence too.

The university had some damage, like the tower pictured to the right of the entrance. It was lifted off the base (left of the entrance) before it collapsed and was decorated like a Christmas tree.

Below - looking towards Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula. It was the site of an early attempt by the French to settle here.

The pohutukawa, the New Zealand Christmas tree, flowers in November and December and was in abundance everywhere you looked. I remember outside the New Zealand pavilion at Expo in Shanghai they had an enormous one positioned where visitors left the long walk through gardens stretching down the pavilion's roof. It was a magnificent specimen, but it was fake. Clever Kiwis!

Driving south of Christchurch we came across the Moeraki Boulders, 60 million year old septarian concretions. It was high tide on a rather murky afternoon. In NZ you can have four seasons in one day, and this was one of those days.

More beautiful scenery - just hundreds of calendar moments dotted along the coastline.

Wildlife is in abundance, and one day we saw blue penguins, fur seals, yellow eyed penguins and albatrosses in settings so beautiful and rugged as to be truly memorable.

You may have to click on the picture below to see the adults and pups on the rocks.

We're standing with the city of Dunedin in the background. We were told that 63 cruise ships will call into Dunedin during 2011.

The architecture is very Scottish. Below is Otago Boys High School.

Here we have the Flemish styled Dunedin station opposite the law courts.

The city is littered with attractive British styled churches. It is quite remarkable to see.

The walk (below) is down to Tunnel Beach. It was stunning, but so was the walk back up. Rene took it in his stride whereas yours truly... well, you can guess how I performed.

We had one night on a farm stay B&B, and we had a tour in the afternoon to see the Charolais cattle, the sheep plus the pigs. Dinner that night was created by our guide, Rob, and we dined on local pork sausage and venison. He was a great bloke, and we would like to visit again one day.

This lighthouse is facing due south - next stop Antarctica. Bracing wind made for an interesting walk up to the light. Incredibly rugged coast, typical of the south of NZ.

Wild water rushing everywhere - along creek beds, river beds and down mountainsides.

This lake, like many dozens here, is really this blue due to the sediment from glaciers suspended in the water. We took dozens of pictures of blue lakes everywhere on the west coast.

We only stopped for lunch in Queenstown. It is the centre of snow skiing for most of the year and in summer is still a magnet to tourists.

Fiordland is the home to Milford Sound. This place is truly spectacular with is near vertical sides, massive falls and deep water. While we were here we also had rain, showers and misty sunshine as well as this sunshine at the start. My favourite day of the trip (I think - I really liked it all).

This was taken on the way back to Te Anau, the place where we spent two nights. Gorgeous! I was half expecting Julie Andrews to appear in the photo declaring 'The hills are alive..."

This could well be in Europe, couldn't it? But no, it's 100% Pure New Zealand!

One of the two glaciers we visited, but Fox Glacier was closed to visitors due to extreme wet weather the previous week, so we went half an hour away to Franz Josef Glacier, where we walked right up to the base. Superb experience!

Me on the way back to Christchurch after having crossed Arthur's Pass. More awesome scenery! I deliberately left the word 'awesome' to the end because it is a much watered down word today where its overuse often makes me want to scream. But here, at the conclusion of our visit, I can only use one word to describe this magnificent South Island. Awesome!

Ditch Hopping Yet Again!

Just back four weeks from NZ and we have already booked a return trip at Easter, this time to Auckland and the North Island. China Airlines have just launched an extension three days a week from their Taipei-Brisbane run to include Auckland, and at a ridiculously low fare. I told my sister in law, who then also booked flights across the Ditch. Steve and Adele are going for 7 nights, but Rene and I are just going for 4. We'll jointly have two nights in Auckland and two nights on the Coromandel Peninsula just 90 minutes south east of the city. Easter merges with Anzac Day this year, so the period Good Friday to the following Tuesday are public holidays.

Logistics and infrastructure.

Whilst there's always room for improvement, I've been really impressed at how the various emergency organisations and the military have cooperated in putting well rehearsed plans into operation during the various emergencies that have beset this entire country lately. Katrina's death toll was around 1800 and thus far ours is less than 40.

Let's not forget the truckies and food organisations that have reduced the impact of empty shelves in our shops. Here in Nundah we did without fresh milk for three days and bread for two. Some fruit and vegetables are still out of stock, but in the main all companies have worked extra hard to minimise the impact of consumers. We are among the very fortunate Queenslanders who have not been directly impacted by the catastrophic events of the past couple of months. Many tens of thousands at this point in time are without a home, power and in some cases family and friends. They say devastating events play out in three monthly cycles - if not immediately then at some stage later. The mental health of many people will have been jarred to some extent. One hopes the services are there for them when they need help.

Many country communities are struggling though, since entire districts have been affected by floods and residual water still around a month later. One shire had 80% of roads and bridges washed away, whilst others have been without power for a long time. I took the time to mention how impressed I was with the shelves at the local supermarket and the manager was surprised by my comment but pleased. He said that they had been working extremely hard, and will continue to work hard every hour of the day to provide what we all come to expect as a matter of course when we step into a store. What an incredible country we are so lucky to live in.

Breaking News! Monday Feb 7...

Would you believe just four weeks since the fatal flash floods swept through Toowoomba, the city was hit yet again with a smaller flash flood this morning. Between 6:30am and 7:30am today the city recorded 64mm of rain (around 2.5").

The story of two cyclones...

...one small, and the other truly enormous! As the state still recovers from the massive floods last month, three weeks later the north and far north of the state gets hit by Cyclone Anthony - not extremely large - and a few days later Cyclone Yasi, reported to be the largest cyclone ever recorded in Australia.

The Premier of Queensland, Anna Bligh, surveys the sea front of Cardwell - or what was left of it. She's accompanied by the Federal Treasurer and Deputy Prime Minister, Wayne Swan, who is our local Federal MP.



This image is of Yasi superimposed on Europe. Winds of up to 300kmh, tidal surges, along with flooding rainfalls all combined to create havoc for our northern neighbours. One person has died in the whole area - due to suffocating from the fumes of a diesel generator operating inside the building and not outside.

Yasi on top of the USA - it was an immense cyclone by any one's standards.

The Senior Citizens Centre in Tully (below) was the designated refuge for the area, but the supervisor (pictured) closed it when she realised the storm would be so very intense. Just as well she got them out and into a safer place.

The day after, these Tully folk - all from one family, plus some friends - pausing during the repairs to the family home.

Port Hinchinbrook was home to millions of dollars worth of boats - now all wrecked and tossed around. Note the buildings which are new and built to withstand the Category 5 (highest rating) cyclone. They appear to have come through this event moderately undamaged (except for a few windows etc).

Another victim of the weather is the farmer, who not only has had their home battered but also their livelihood seriously impaired for at least a year. A significant percentage of the banana crops were ruined - and this region is our major supplier.

After the peak has passed...

Brisbane is still enduring the effects of a devastating flood; and along with nearby Ipswich and the Lockyer Valley, 80% of our state of Queensland has been declared a natural disaster zone. That is an area of 1 000 000 square kilometres, or the area of France and Germany combined. For those of you who know about Hurricane Katrina in the USA two years ago, that covered an area of 230 000 sq km. In addition large tracts of New South Wales and Victoria are also under threat from floods right now, so you could be looking at an area almost the size of Western Europe - unbelievable!

This gives you a little idea, but you have to understand that the Brisbane River is a delta river and meanders along towards the bay and ocean. We are the only Australian capital city with such a river.
The photo above I took, and it shows some of the many, many train sets 'parked' along high tracks that wouldn't get flooded. They stayed there for three days. There were dozens and dozens of three car trains nose to nose along every secure track in Brisbane, guarded 24/7.

The town house of a friend went under up to the steps into the first floor, but the basement plus his things in storage went under. He only arrived back from the UK that morning as the waters were inundating the city. It is just at the bottom of the long white roof, towards the left. He was very fortunate it went no further.

This lovely home featured in my last blog before Christmas. It went under - somewhere in the picture below. It is three blocks back from the river, but it went up to the third shelf in the kitchen cupboards. An army of friends and family plus other unknown volunteers swung into action to help clean up the mess and dump dishwashers and stoves etc onto the footpaths. We had plans to go as a second wave to relieve tired cleaners, but it was truly impossible to enter the area by car - the streets were a veritable car park - so we stayed put high and dry in our home.

The pictures are all a day old, so the peak had been past and the river was slowly receding, but the thick mud and the smell was still very fresh indeed. I have a link, but you'll have to copy and paste in your browser, of the floods across Brisbane from the air. The house mentioned above is in the middle, but you can scroll up and across to see other areas too. Quite fascinating: http://www.nearmap.com/?q=crowthers@-27.5071699,153.0202623&ll=-27.50709,153.020334&z=21&t=k&nmd=20110113

Other parts of the state had floods before the New Year, and Condamine has gone through its third inundation (with consequent evacuations) and Dalby just past Toowoomba to the west has had five - YES, FIVE floods - and at the moment that seems to be it, but we're only at the beginning of the season for rains and who knows what will be next? I know there are no more records to be broken for coldest this, wettest that, hottest this and so on...Mother Nature has thrown it all at us this past few months, but we will endure and learn from all of this.

The picture (above) is of the runway at Rockhampton Airport, now closed for two weeks and due to reopen next Monday (24th). They have been doing it really tough in Central Queensland too, and it's hard to keep all the disasters in mind as you live with the local one that seems to consume one, yet you have to remember those other communities doing it tough. Some have lived without power for three weeks so far and food drops.

Rene and I arrived back last Monday from NZ to the news of a wall of water hitting first Toowoomba, then the communities in the Lockyer Valley between Toowoomba and Brisbane. Toowoomba is my old home town, and it is 700m above sea level. At 3pm last Monday the incessant rain got heavier suddenly, and a wall of water swept through the city centre washing cars and people away. There a mother and son died - just out that afternoon shopping for school clothes and books for the return to school this coming week.

This massive downpour of over 1 hour also drenched the ranges leading down to the valley floor below, and thus an 8m high wall of water descended upon an unsuspecting series of communities washing away not only homes and crops but also the people huddled inside the homes - there was no warning! Nothing in recorded history had ever happened like this before, and the valley was settled for farming 150 years ago. 18 died there, and a further 27 are still missing, but sadly they are dead - just not found. I had a first hand report of a mother wearing just a gold bracelet on her arm, nothing else. She was alive, but her husband and two children were washed away and still missing.

This week I read of Sri Lanka and Brazil having equally tragic floods, with many more deaths and of course the economic cost associated with them. This is not a competition for most bodies or most cost - all are tragedies - but this is personal, here in Queensland and the rest of Australia, and I can tell you nearly a week later 10 000 homes will probably never be habitable again, 7000 businesses are without power, 27 000 homes have no power yet. Five towers in the Brisbane CBD still are without power, and this afternoon three towers lost power again and workers sent home. Our leading hotel, the Stamford Plaza, is still closed, and many basements are full of water and mud.

As I type, a severe storm is happening across our region, so there could be more fun and games, but also there's a chance some heavy rain might wash away some extra layers of mud.

(edit - just ran downstairs and retrieved washing from the line - I was so engrossed in writing this blog that I didn't notice it very dark and threatening - saved it all except for a few spots)

I just can't convey the enormity of the tragedy in the Lockyer Valley and Toowoomba. We have lost streets and properties to the water, but nothing like the walls of water that swept people away last Monday. The world has seen it on their local TV news plus BBC World and CNN - hence the flood of emails and calls from around Australia and the world (thanks, we appreciated your concern). Rene and I are high and dry, and our local creek that has on occasions flooded did not go beyond its banks this time because the rain stopped at 5pm Tuesday - it isn't connected to the river in any way. The rain stopped, our creek subsided, so that on Wednesday morning as houses began going under along the river in Ipswich and Brisbane we looked out to a very low creek indeed.

It was very sudden in Toowomba and the Lockyer valley, almost without warning.

Another family out shopping when the wall of water hit. I met a family from Grantham in Lincolnshire (UK) Sunday morning at the airport heading back home and they had been in the Toowoomba Coffee Club 10 minutes prior to the flood - their meter was expiring, so after debating to move the car and stay or go back to their relative's home, they decided since it was raining they'd drive off - five minutes before the wall of water swept through the city centre. How lucky!

The Coffee Club is upper left of the intersection (above). Amazing film features on You Tube.

There is a weird feeling of guilt in my mind as I think how lucky we are and how unfortunate others are, yet we have to go on and assist in the recovery of the state. Estimates so far are of a bill for A$20b, mostly borne by the Federal Government. The insurance industry is in for a major hit too, with many expensive residences along the river here in Brisbane suffering very expensive damage. Everyone affected was given $1000 per adult and $400 per child by the Federal Government to cover immediate incidentals, and that was immediately available to applicants the next day. Mobile banks set up at evacuation centres, and the defence force immediately had troops and equipment deployed to the various regions as events unfolded over the last three weeks. Our Premier, not exactly the most popular politician in the state, has been lauded for her performance as the crisis unfolded. No end of people have said to me of their surprise and pleasure in being able to commend her. All of our agencies have worked together in a fantastic way up to now, but the true test will be in the long term because this isn't going to be cleaned up inside of a month or two - this will take easily two years or more to be fully rebuilt and operational.

Here in Nundah were without milk for three days and bread for two - bloody lucky! Some poor sods in the centre of the state are likely to need food drops for weeks ahead, but at least the major roads are open again to trucks. Fruit and veggies will be short for quite some time, but I've been absolutely amazed at how the logistics to supply food in an emergency have swung into operation - most impressed! Example would be the main Rocklea Markets which is central in distribution of fruit and vegetables across the state, and it was totally submerged, yet yesterday reopened (well, three quarters of it did).

I went to the airport after a call went out for Ambassadors to come and assist the overrun information desk at International. Four of us turned up on Wednesday, and five on Thursday - although we eventually sent two home because it was less intense by then. There were 150 pax camped in International and 250 at Domestic. Many were evacuated from their City accommodation, many back packers too, and they made it to the airport because they thought it might close. Well, there was no way it was closing or close to it, but they were happy to be there. Getting to the airport was difficult too, because roads were blocked and transport running erratically, or not at all. It was rewarding to help there and to assist very confused pax who were, in some cases, totally unaware of what was happening in Brisbane, and the rest of the state. One example was a French couple with no English who had transport booked to the city and a hotel, but couldn't understand why it wasn't happening, and our regular French speaker was not working that night (helping in the floods) so we employed a translation service to assist. Others working on a remote Pacific island building a school returned with only the rumours from the plane, and I know how limiting that can be because we returned from NZ to be told by the taxi driver of the Toowoomba flood, and I couldn't comprehend the details at all.

That's enough! I hope this has filled you in a little. I know it's a bit wordy, but it has been good to sit down and write this account.

Next time I'll write something on our brilliant trip to New Zealand. It was marvellous! I'll also mention my cousin Rachel who will be visiting us next summer with her family. Exciting news!