A low pressure trough settles over Southeast Queensland and it rains and it rains and it rains...

The past couple of weeks in Queensland felt a little like how soldiers describe war, long periods of inactivity and frustration followed by intense drama and action. For days last week, apart from those in flood evacuation centres or search and rescue ops, it was about staying out of the way, keeping the roads clear, bursts of furniture removal for friends and family and timeless television.

Let’s hope we avoid the post traumatic disorders, the recovery is now begun.

It began for me on Christmas day. After lunch I took to the road, loaded with gear to attend the Woodford Festival. It pays to establish camp on Christmas day, the only chance of camping on the hill and as it turned out a relatively fine day. The next two were like being on the the deck of a sailing ship running before a storm, battling squalls, adjusting sails/tarpaulins, trying to stay dry and protect the camp from the encroaching elements.

The festival site itself was good, apart from some inevitable inundation of the venues, but the shows went on and a good time was had by all regardless of the weather. At the camp ground it was somewhat different.

Normally we get storms, buckets of rain in short bursts which test the skills of campers, this year it was drenching, constant rain, with short breaks to maintain a veneer of optimism. At the beginning the ground was merely waterlogged, but once cars and vans and trudging gumboots broke the top layer the place turned into a bog.

We had heard Woodford called Mudford before, this year it was Waterford, Woodford ponds, lakes etc. But that was just the beginning and generally, despite the rain it was fun, it was wet, but it was fun.

A week later it was tragic. The day Toowoomba got whacked is now etched in the national memory. Cars cascading over water walls, lives swept away, screams and laconic commentary intermingled with images of chaos and catastrophe.

Whole towns were sideswiped or swamped in the Lockyer Valley, Murphy’s Creek, Postman’s Ridge, Helidon and Grantham, the inland tsunami left its calling card with frightening power and devastating effects. There was our local market F&V lady on national TV in tears and shaking, describing or attempting to describe what had happened.

Then it all went slow motion, waiting in a ghost town for the inevitable. The fast rising, slow bursting, Brisbane and Bremer rivers claimed their houses, among them my sister’s. The city was emptied as the Premier, and Lord Mayor advised people to stay out of the way. It was somewhat confusing as Campbell Newman also seemed to expect people to turn up to work while the city was shutting down.

For Queensland Shelter staff we closed for the week, after Tuesday, as many of us live in areas difficult to travel from and to. Thankfully none were inundated.

As Ipswich went under we began to see the effect on property and the impact of previous planning decisions. The Bremer and Lockyer rivers do not run to dams, they pour into Ipswich and then onto Brisbane unimpeded. In Ipswich the flood was higher than 1974, but thankfully there was no further loss of life.

There were however devastated looks and the prospect of long term homelessness for people who never thought it would happen to them. Houses start floating off their stumps, containers joined the flotsam, boats lost their moorings, moorings lost their hold and were swept up by the current. TV presenters competed to be compassionate, old Brisbane, Ipswich and Lockyer Valley hands were drafted and for the most part their distress was genuine and their outpourings real.

By this stage I am battling unkind thoughts like “Why don’t we see this level of compassion for the homeless in general?” Why does it take a major catastrophe for people to get the point? Do they not realise that homelessness is this devastating for whoever, whenever?”  Whatever!

A small news item in the paper points to similar conditions in Brazil, eventually 1000 deaths will be recorded there. It helps to keep things in perspective.

Premier Bligh displays the same courage and leadership that helped her ancestor - Lieutenant, Bligh navigate 3800 miles of treacherous seas in an open boat carrying 18 followers, as Fletcher Christian and his gang returned to the seductions of the South Pacific.

The comparisons were made to 1974, 1893 and 1841 as Brisbane started to go under. Initially expected to be lower than 1974, then higher, it eventually reached 4.85 metres at the Brisbane gauge below the 6 metres odd in 1974 and well below the 8.3 metres of 1893.

There is a palpable relief except for those whose homes drown. The warning at least gave people the opportunity to save furniture, photos and other personal treasures.  One young man is lost after drowning in a drain trying to get to a family home to assess the damage.

Saturday, January 15 sees some 40,000 people officially register as volunteers to help clean up the mess. The real figure must have been something like 120,000. I meet family and friends at my sister’s place in Graceville, the place went under to the top of windows but didn’t reach the ceilings.

There are 20 others present, not one has registered to volunteer. Already a construction firm has two trucks and bobcats working to clear mess and by 3:00 p.m. the street is empty and every house affected, probably 10 overall, has been emptied, gurneyed, cleaned and disinfected. Most homes, even in Graceville are spared.

My sister shed tears at the sight of her piano, bought by our father for her daughter, crushed in the jaws of a machine dumped on the back of a truck. It might have been saved, but like many other possessions that day, it was discarded as too muddy by the zeal of the mass.

All through the street, folks clean gear from flooded properties, bring food and drinks and as the army of official volunteers arrive, there is little left to do, but the next street will need them so they moved on.

I mark the level by my sister’s front door, we finish the tea and coffee, thank all those who helped and offer our thanks and best wishes to the construction guys who have even cleaned the grates over the drains. I have never witnessed such an explosion of goodwill and spontaneous industry, but nobody takes thanks seriously, everybody nods and thinks about the next house.

Over 20,000 properties were affected, the city centre was emptied, 22 lives lost and countless others wrecked. The blame started early, by Monday The Australian is running stories about how the Wivenhoe dam operators could have released more water earlier to ease the flood in the Capital.

On Tuesday we hold a meeting at 20 hours notice with over 20 organisations in attendance. We record our considerations and pass them on to Ministers and officials. We are concerned about the medium term futures of displaced households.

Land lords appeal for negotiation and compassion for their renters, investors offer rent freezes, we call for the release of unoccupied properties and spare caravans to ease the crisis. We want people to be able to stay in their new-found communities, now they have come to know their neighbours.

The twittersphere has come to our aid with rooming sites and help pouring from the collective goodwill. But the real test will come over the next month as we attempt to house, clothe and furnish the new homeless.

South East Queensland has 90,000 unoccupied dwellings on any given night and no doubt there have been many kind offers in private. We could solve our homelessness permanently with a fraction of these on tap.

The long test will measure our planning systems, our building programs, our fortitude for the hard decisions. So far, so good.

The bridge at Fernvale on the Brisbane Valley Highway opened on Saturday. Dead fish could be seen and smelt 20 metres above the still raging river. Swathes of former pastures now host lakes and gorges and a brown line marks the high mark of flood. Not a tree still stands in the river bed, and tanks and boats sit atop their twisted trunks.

 I have been visiting Esk, where my father outlaw lives, for 25 years and never have I seen Redbank Creek come close to the top and yet water had rushed past the racecourse washing away the park where the rail used to run. The rail bridge, which stood for over a hundred years, is now so many sticks and YouTube has footage of the coop checkouts serving in water up to their knees.

The dam itself looks like mud soup while the country all around looks green and fresh and lush. A former American acquaintance remarked on, what she sees as, the over-generous nature of flood payments and the grapevine runs its tales of rip-offs and un-warranted claims.

By Monday Centrelink had formed its cheat squads and the inquiry began its task. The mud-army is stood down from its grimy work and life begins its return to normal. In Brazil the masses still mourn for a thousand but I haven’t yet seen a story or appeal for them.

Another low moved over NSW and Victoria, the Murray will have her fill this year. Cyclones also ripped through the Pacific, la Nina has wrought a terrible cost.

Adrian Pisarski