Tropical Cyclone Alfred slows, but prepares to pound South East Queensland, northern NSW
The cyclone’s dramatic slowing increases the risk it will gain strength and smash Queensland and NSW with rain and floods.
Tropical Cyclone Alfred has slowed dramatically, increasing the risk it will gather strength and smash Brisbane, the Gold Coast and northern NSW with more rain and dangerous flooding.
The category-2 storm is now forecast to hit North Stradbroke Island, off Brisbane, at about 10pm on Friday, and then make landfall on the mainland at about Wynnum in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Alfred is now moving at 10km/hr and is about 245km east of Brisbane, causing heavy rain and power outages on the Gold Coast and northern New South Wales, while the sun continues to shine in Brisbane and on the Sunshine Coast.
About 5000 properties are already without electricity in the Redlands and on the Gold Coast, but Premier David Crisafulli insisted crews were working to restore power as soon as possible. There are several thousand properties on the Tweed Coast and in Lismore also cut off from power.
Senior meteorologist Dean Narramore said people should be prepared for widespread flooding in far South East Queensland and northern NSW, and dangerous storm surges and storm tides.
“The main impact of the system slowing down … we’re going to have an extended and more prolonged period of significant and major wave heights, leading to significant coastal erosion,” Mr Narramore said, noting all beaches in the affected area between the Sunshine Coast and Byron Bay would experience erosion and big waves.
“We’re going to have a longer and prolonged period of heavy rainfall, particularly in northeast NSW. We’ve already seen widespread heavy falls through there, and that’s going to continue right through Thursday, Friday and Saturday, and this means major flooding is likely in rivers in northeast NSW, and could even see moderate to major flooding in parts of South East Queensland as well.”
Residents in South East Queensland and northern NSW now have at least an extra day to prepare for the first cyclone to cross this far down the east coast since 1974, as damaging wind gusts of up to 120km begin to pummel the coast from Coolangatta on the Gold Coast to Ballina in northern NSW.
Huge swells are also developing. At Main Beach, on the Gold Coast, a record-breaking wave of 12.3m was recorded overnight.
In the last 24 hours, Springbrook, on the Gold Coast hinterland, while Mullumbimby, near Byron Bay, had 168mm, and Dorrigo, on the Coffs Coast, was hit by more than 200mm.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has warned against complacency, declaring the slower cyclone was still a serious threat.
“It is important to stress it’s still anticipated that this will cross into land and will reach landfall, it will just do it later,” Mr Albanese said in Canberra.
“And a risk is of course that in slowing up, it increases in its intensity, but at this stage it is still predicted to be Category 2, as it crosses onto land.
“It is expected to make an impact on Friday. We expect three separate hazards, storm surges and high tides along coastal communities and severe wins as Alfred approaches the coast.”
He said supermarkets in the affected area would close on Thursday.
Heavy lift helicopters from the National Aerial Fire Fighting Fleet have been pre-positioned at Coffs Harbour in northern NSW and Bundaberg on Queensland’s central coast.
The PM said a crisis operation team will run out of Canberra
“(Canberra) is probably the best place I can be to make sure that there is seamless activity between NSW and Queensland,” Mr Albanese said.
Schools are already shut, public transport has halted, and the Gold Coast and Ballina airports are closed.
Flight cancellations in Brisbane are mounting, with a slew of international services in and out of Brisbane now axed due to the looming threat posed by Cyclone Alfred.
Singapore Airlines was one of the first to move, cancelling six services scheduled for Thursday and Friday.
In Brisbane, the council has bowed to pressure to reopen sandbagging stations, after Lord-Mayor Adrian Schrinner ordered they shut on Wednesday night as the cyclone neared.
NSW Premier Chris Minns said there were 20,000 houses that emergency crews have prepared to evacuate and that there is still “widespread potential damage” in northern NSW and South East Queensland despite the delayed expected landfall.
He said the federal government and NSW government had asked supermarkets to stay open in the regions that will be affected.
“People still need to eat, and we hope and expect Woolworths and Coles to be open today,” he told Sky News.
“Our understanding is that maybe a bit under half of the northern rivers Woolworths stores are open today, having originally been slated to be closed. They’re going to open their doors, which is good news.
“But unfortunately … it’s a bit of an hour-by-hour proposition.”
He warned that parts of the state may see sandbag shortages.
“The SES is working to resupply Byron,” he said. “We didn’t have shortages yesterday.
“We’re expecting it to run a little bit short, but pre-supplies, they don’t have to come all the way from Sydney, they’re pre-supplied into the northern rivers. So hopefully we can fix that as the day goes on.
“We’re going to have shortages as the next 72 hours eventuate, but with good co-operation across the levels of government and working closely with the community, if we can keep communication up, if we can get the latest information, hopefully we won’t have too many shortages.”
He said the state had “pre-positioned” 2000 SES volunteers, including 40 flood rescue crews.
Residents of Brisbane and surrounding areas have been warned not to be fooled by blue skies and very light winds on Thursday, as Cyclone Alfred slows its path towards the Queensland capital.
Dr Martin Jucker of the University of New South Wales’ climate change research centre, said it might look fine, but the massive weather system was “definitely coming”.
“There’s no way Brisbane is going to get out of this, it’s going to be impacted. The forecasters are not getting it wrong,” said Dr Jucker, an expert in atmospheric dynamics.
“All the track predictions show it’s going to go over Brisbane, there’s going to be very strong winds, loads of rain, everything that’s been predicted.”
He said it was worth remembering that the “cone symbols” plotting the cyclone’s path simply showed where the centre is, and the effects would be felt much more widely.
But Dr Jucker said there was some benefit to residents in the cyclone making landfall late Friday afternoon as opposed to the early hours of the morning.
“When you can see what’s happening, that’s probably better in my experience. During the night when you can only hear the wind and rain is a bit more scary.”
Brisbane is the only Australian capital other than Darwin to have experienced a direct hit from a cyclone, which Dr Jucker said simply came down to geography.
And he dismissed any suggestion that a tropical cyclone in the subtropics was related to climate change.
“It’s really due to the specific meteorological pattern that we have now, this week,” he said.
“It’s not a consequence of long term changes but what is happening exactly right now that made this particular path possible.”
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