On 15 February, Mackay received flooding rains (about 600mm in a few hours). Apparently there were two separate fronts converging right over Mackay, and of course the tide was coming in at the same time, so all the extra water had nowhere to go.For the first few hours of the day, we watched the water level rising into Ian's classrooms, and took some photos. Then after the waters began to recede, after high tide, we went for a walk around the block. The Gooseponds, normally a placid little lake, was now a rushing great swathe of water. Many homes were substantially under water. Many cars had been completely submerged.
This event was a tragedy for the people of Mackay. Many lost homes and treasured posessions. Fortunately nobody died. (Just a few days before the flood, one of Ian's senior students from 2007, Reece Hines, was swept over a weir at Mirani, upriver from Mackay. His body was found on 14 February.)
Our church (which had narrowly escaped being flooded) became an official Community Recovery Centre, where people could go for moral support, a warm cup of tea, and to apply for emergency assistance and/or government relief.
For more flood details, check our individual blog entries: Ian, Laetitia.
The flood also brought to Mackay some scaly visitors. Apparently crocodiles were seen swimming down some of the streets in South Mackay! We managed to catch up with one of the possibly two that took up residence in the Gooseponds.
