Hi guys!
Thanks so much for your concern! We are high and dry, thankfully. I have
largely been offline and just FB'ing on my iphone as we have been told to
conserve water/power etc as much as possible. I have been tempted to get
out and take some pics but just can't bring myself to do it as there is so
much suffering going on and the government is imploring people not to do
so.
My husband works in the city in one of the worst affected areas of
flooding
at the biggest hospital in the state. Due to a few emergencies, he was
required to stay back amongst it all whilst our (uninsured!) car was
parked
right in the middle of the flood zone. I was very panicked cause if we
lose
that car, we are buggered, with five kids and all. I was also freaking
out
that he would try and be a hero and get to it somehow (it is a raised 4wd
so
could most likely be driven out if he could reach it). Anyways, as it
turned out, he had to walk through waist deep water to get to it, but was
able to save it and get back to the hospital in time to assist a lady
delivering a 25 week old baby via emergency c-section. It is not known if
the baby will survive. :(
That pales in comparison though to another story that was just publicised
in
the area of Grantham (where almost all of the fatalities have been, and
continue to be discovered). A lady gave birth to her baby on her kitchen
bench with her husband standing in knee deep water to deliver it. Then
all
three of them had to spend the night on the bench as the water rose around
them. Thankfully, they were airlifted to safety early in the morning,
just
as the water was about to consume them. How's that for an amazing story?
It is sunny and bright here today. A typical summer's day. Dry around
our
house and our suburb. It is a surreal thing to know that if I got in the
car and drove for 10minutes, I would be entering a veritable war zone and
witnessing utter destruction and tragedy. There are helicopters
constantly
going over to remind us of it, and yet, if it wasn't for the empty
supermarket shelves and the fact that we now have to boil our drinking
water, things would be oddly normal for us.
Yesterday, when dropping my husband at work between tides, I made a wrong
turn and ended up on a one way street over the bridge to Southbank/West
End,
due to road closures. I had two of my kids in the car and it completely
freaked me out as I don't know the area well at the best of times and
trying
to find a dry road to turn down was scary. It took me an hour and a half
to navigate the suburb just to find a way back to the bridge and to
safety.
It was in the peak time as the water was rising heading to high tide and I
was really scared when the gravity of it hit me.
Things to note that you might not understand in the US - there is two lots
of flooding that you may be seeing on the news. One is the flash flooding
that occurred in the Toowoomba/Withcott/Grantham/Marburg area. This is
where the fatalities have occurred as it was described as an "inland
tsunami" and not only was everything wet/muddy, but it was violent and
destructive too. The images/stories that you are seeing of people trapped
in cars etc are from this event. It is true that they won't be finding
many
of the victims for coming days as due to continued rain in the area,
recovery operations weren't able to access them. It is a sad fact that
yes,
there were entire families trapped in cars and possibly drowned. :( One
particularly heartbreaking story was of a family of a mum and her 10 year
old and 13 year old boys being rescued from a vehicle. The 13 year old
told
the rescuer to save his little brother first, which they did, and the 13
year old and his mum were subsequently drowned. Another was of a family
being rescued in a boat and their life-jacket wearing 4 year old fell over
the side and was swept away and drowned. I can't think of any more
insurmountable horror in my mind then seeing my 4 year old baby swept away
and drowned in raging flood waters. I had to stop myself from watching
the
news after hearing this one, to say that it is heartbreaking is an
understatement.
So, the second type of flooding is what Brisbane/Ipswich is experiencing
now. It is a result of all of our creek/catchment systems converging and
carrying downstream the masses of water that has accumulated from other
flooded regions. All of this water is trying to get out to sea, and
basically, Brisbane is in the way. Brisbane is built over and around the
river that is carrying all of this water, and the banks are/were unable to
contain it thus, it is seeping out into the city/suburbs. This is the
flooding that I witnessed in Southbank/West End yesterday. It is an eerie
thing. All of the power has been cut, so the suburbs are really quiet.
People were just standing around watching the water as it was rising
silently and engulfing their lives. It was almost like a fog sweeping in,
just menacingly edging in and bit by bit covering everything in its path.
Thirdly, the thing with Brisbane is that the Brisbane River is tidal. So,
there are continued "peaks" with each tide. And, between tides, the
flooding drops significantly, only to return again 12 hours later. The
peak
that occurred at 4am this morning was due to this, and was considered to
be
the highest that the water levels will come up. Then, at high tide this
afternoon, it will be up again but not as high as this morning, and with
each high tide subsequently, it will be lower than the previous one, until
it starts to pull away from the areas not normally flooded.
This experience for us anyways, in some ways has been similar to our
experience of 9/11, in that we are kind of outside observers but glued to
the television/internet, not wanting to turn away for a second in case it
suddenly changes and heads in our direction. It has commanded our full
attention and basically rendered us all incapable of continuing every day
tasks, even though we are still dry, if that makes any sense? Obviously
the
after effects and global scale of it are nowhere near the same as 9/11,
but
I am sure you get what I mean. We are thanking our lucky stars, just as
we
were during 9/11 that we are where we are and that not being able to buy
groceries and having to boil our drinking water is as bad as it gets for
us.
Personally, I am also very relieved that my older kids are visiting their
Dad in North Qld at the moment, so are completely unaffected by it all.
We are planning on taking it in turns to go into the city and volunteer in
recovery efforts in coming days, as one of us will always need to be here
with the kids, as we really want to help. It is hard though as many of my
clients are interstate/international and are still demanding photos on
deadlines, not realising the full gravity of what we are experiencing here
at the moment.
The thing is though, whilst so much media attention is on Brisbane, with
it
being the state capital, there are many other towns since Christmas that
have been in dire straits (such as Rockhampton/Emerald where my
mother/family live), and the rainfall that we have been experiencing has
now
moved southward and will be creating havoc in NSW, VIC and SA now. We
also
have alerts out now about gastro/mosquito related illnesses/disease, so I
guess we have all of that fun to look forward to in coming weeks too.
Thanks again guys/gals, we are safe, which is much more than many of my
friends/family are!
Hugs,
Tan.x.
-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of
Stan
Halpin
Sent: Thursday, 13 January 2011 11:21 AM
To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List
Subject: Re: Queensland Floods
I only rarely log onto Facebook, but just went there to check on Tanya's
current status. (Which is as good as can be expected. There was a scare
that
her husband might not make it home from work through flooded streets but
he
and the car made it.) While there I noted a post from Jay Taylor. The
fundraising for his daughter's funeral (and her son's future expenses)
continues. Go here http://funds.gofundme.com/1nuo0 to donate.
stan
On Jan 12, 2011, at 6:31 AM, Mark Roberts wrote:
Tan has been posting comments on Facebook. The's still above the water
line at last report.
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