South East Queensland floods

[Bob Crowley]

We've had a lot of rain over the last 4 days. I've recorded a bit over 300 mm (12 inches) and there appears to be another 50 mm (2 inches) in the rain gauge since I looked earlier this morning. I'll measure it again tomorrow.

We're not affected much as we're on a hill, apart from inconvenience, but the area around Gympie and the Sunshine Coast has taken a hammering.

I was prompted to calculate how much water is held up in the air. If I use a rough figure of a 200 x 200 kilometres area, and we average 16 inches (400 mm), and it's a lot higher than that in some places, then over the five days including tomorrow, I figured the total amount of water is about 12 x 10^9 tonnes, or 12 billion tonnes.

Someone may want to check my figures, but we take the huge forces involved in our weather for granted. Most of the time it is beneficial, and not harmful.

Live: Gympie set for record flood, Brisbane River rising as rain continues across south-east Queensland

The low shown in this radar image has been hanging around for days.

http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDR662.loop.shtml

At least our main dams Somerset and Wivenhoe are full again. I'm one of those who think the Wolfdene Dam should have been built years ago and I still do, but at least we've probably got 3 or 4 years reprieve before the next potential shortfall.

I hope they get the water supply guaranteed before the 2032 Olympic Games which are going to be held in Brisbane. The population in SE Queensland is growing rapidly.

 

[Bob Crowley]

As an addendum, I recorded another 209 mm (a bit over 8 inches) this morning, so that's about 500 mm, half a metre, over the last 5 days.

PS - If we've received 500 mm, it's probably a good estimate for the whole area, although some got a lot more.

That means that 20 billion tonnes of rain has fallen over the entire area for the last 5 days.

As I said before, we take the enormous forces acting on our weather for granted.

As Hebrews 10:31 "It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

This is the God who formed the universe from nothing, who created black holes, asteroids that wipe out 90% if life on earth, tidal waves and all the other potential cataclysms of nature. He's also the one who designed the butterfly.

We're taking a risk if we ignore Him. It was Christ himself who said of His own Father, "Believe me, Him you should fear".

 

[Bob Crowley]

Since we've received so much rain in the last few days (I measured 737 millimetres from 22/2 to 27/2, or about 29 inches), our dams are now almost all full or overflowing. The following table gives some idea.

Dam levels | Seqwater

Note that some of the dams are old and small, dating back to the early days of Brisbane. Some are for recreation or agriculture only.

A few weeks ago our main dam Wivenhoe was down to about 40% capacity. It's now at 169.9%, and utilising flood storage capacity to do so. The flooding would have been worse without it.

In 2008 before the drought broke it was at about 16% and those days will come back sometime, but we've been given a reprieve, albeit at the cost of the suffering of a lot of people.

'It came in when they said it would be going down': Evacuated Brisbane residents tell of rush to beat flood

But when I look at the dams list, there is one outlier, a small dam called Clarendon at 29.1% despite the massive amount of rain we've had. It's got a 4.2 kilometre wall, and a catchment area of 3.4 square kilometres. I wonder why they even bothered to build it.

 

[Bob Crowley]

The flooding has become far more widespread.

Lismore suffered badly, and now there is major flooding in parts of Sydney.

Live: People flee homes as Sydney's rivers swell, storms bring more rain to flood-affected Queensland

 

[Bob Crowley]

This a personal anecdote which came to mind when I saw a sub-heading on the ABC News about cracks in Maclean's levee system with the recent floods.

Maclean in northern NSW braces for floodwaters as cracks form in levee

I used to see a psychiatrist for depression in the early stages. I was on Prozac for some years. But I soon found out we both shared some spiritual experiences, and we continued our sessions mainly for that reason.

A few years ago I told him about a "voice" that had a very clear message. He replied, "That's interesting. Did I tell you my story?" He hadn't so I asked him what it was. He said he'd been sitting in his office when a voice said to him loud and clear "Go to Maclean!"

He said it was pretty firm with no ifs or buts about it. But he didn't even know which Maclean it was referring to. There's a North and South Maclean not far from where I live, and another one in northern NSW. There could be more for all i know.

So he just noted it. About two weeks later he was involved in a "family healing mass" in Lismore in northern NSW. Afterwards an aboriginal woman came up to him and said "I don't want to cause any trouble or make an issue, but I seem to be getting told you should go to Maclean." Since he'd already been warned about it, he went to Maclean.

There's a bit more to the story, but I won't go into that. But right now both Lismore and Maclean are in the news due to the floods.

Family of Stuart Bock, who died in the Lismore floods, pay tribute to a man with a 'heart of gold'

It was only the business of the Maclean levee that reminded me of the psychiatrist's story. I suppose it puts the locations in context, for me anyway.