Ah Harry ... I mean Kevin ...

I can't help it, I still love Kevin Rudd. Australia's former prime minister, now foreign minister, was out on the streets of Brisbane today, trousers rolled up to his pasty white knees and tide marks to his thighs, carrying stuff to help evacuate people in his region. He evac-ed the belongings of a bunch of Korean students who are all on holidays and were going to lose everything. Bless him. A group of journos and stickybeaks started paying attention to him, so he roped them into helping.

Meanwhile, in his official capacity, Kevin announced today that offers of international help had been pouring in. Some from Australia's traditional friends, the US and UK (Thanks, Barack and Clameron!), some from European nations that have strong links with this country (most of them -- did you know Australia has the third largest Greek city in the world after Athens and Thessaloniki?).

And there are also significant offers from Indonesia, our giant northern neighbour that is not hugely rich. There were frosty relations between Australia and Indonesia for about thirty years over East Timor and events relating to it, which eased dramatically in the aftermath of the Pacific Tsunami and earthquakes that followed. It's strange that natural disasters can sometimes accelerate diplomacy in a way that nothing else can.

African nations are also offering support, even though many are currently stretched supporting countries in their own region. It's very heartwarming.

The good news is that Australia is comparatively wealthy, and even though these floods will take billions off the GDP for the next two years (agriculture and mining will be slow to recover), we have not had a recession during the GFC and are better positioned to weather the blow, as it were, than most of our G20 colleagues. So while we may require aid in terms of experts, equipment and maybe even manpower depending on how bad things get, from a money perspective, we'll cope as a country.

It is individuals who are going to have problems, with many underinsured or not insured at all. Millions of dollars have been pouring into the government fund, but thousands are affected, and whole homes are being lost. If you have spare funds, there are sites for donation. Many don't, good thoughts are just as valuable, and if you have Queenslanders on your flists, so is taking the time to comment to them and let them talk about what's going on. Having a good yarn, as they say in Oz, is thoroughly therapeutic.

Ah Harry ... I mean Kevin ...

I can't help it, I still love Kevin Rudd. Australia's former prime minister, now foreign minister, was out on the streets of Brisbane today, trousers rolled up to his pasty white knees and tide marks to his thighs, carrying stuff to help evacuate people in his region. He evac-ed the belongings of a bunch of Korean students who are all on holidays and were going to lose everything. Bless him. A group of journos and stickybeaks started paying attention to him, so he roped them into helping.

Meanwhile, in his official capacity, Kevin announced today that offers of international help had been pouring in. Some from Australia's traditional friends, the US and UK (Thanks, Barack and Clameron!), some from European nations that have strong links with this country (most of them -- did you know Australia has the third largest Greek city in the world after Athens and Thessaloniki?).

And there are also significant offers from Indonesia, our giant northern neighbour that is not hugely rich. There were frosty relations between Australia and Indonesia for about thirty years over East Timor and events relating to it, which eased dramatically in the aftermath of the Pacific Tsunami and earthquakes that followed. It's strange that natural disasters can sometimes accelerate diplomacy in a way that nothing else can.

African nations are also offering support, even though many are currently stretched supporting countries in their own region. It's very heartwarming.

The good news is that Australia is comparatively wealthy, and even though these floods will take billions off the GDP for the next two years (agriculture and mining will be slow to recover), we have not had a recession during the GFC and are better positioned to weather the blow, as it were, than most of our G20 colleagues. So while we may require aid in terms of experts, equipment and maybe even manpower depending on how bad things get, from a money perspective, we'll cope as a country.

It is individuals who are going to have problems, with many underinsured or not insured at all. Millions of dollars have been pouring into the government fund, but thousands are affected, and whole homes are being lost. If you have spare funds, there are sites for donation. Many don't, good thoughts are just as valuable, and if you have Queenslanders on your flists, so is taking the time to comment to them and let them talk about what's going on. Having a good yarn, as they say in Oz, is thoroughly therapeutic.

It's still flooding ...

My friend i_autumnheart   is in a safe spot in Queensland, and doubtless doing dozens of useful things, because she is terrific and like that. One of them is this map: 


You can see the size of Australia compared to the continental USA. The dark blue line is the normal monsoon zone. The blue and pale blue lines were the original estimates of the flooded and flood-affected (cut off as well as largely underwater) areas, the purple and magenta lines are autumn's updated areas as of this afternoon. The flood-affected area in Queensland alone is already significantly bigger than the state of Texas, the flooded area larger than California. (If you can only think in terms of Europe, check out this link for comparative sizes.) Thanks, anthraxia , for the original link.

Careful viewers will notice there are two other major floods in the country at the moment. If you look down to the bottom left and find Perth, a bit below LA, there is a massive fire near there that has only just been brought under control.

The upside of living in a country of such madness is that people are generally great. It's not just the former Prime Minister, many people have been fabulous with supermarkets giving away stock to local people and strangers continuing to form human chains to help people rescue possessions and stock. The RSPCA put out an alert because they were unable to cope and within two hours people had stepped forward to foster all the excess animals at that time. People who were evac-ing an old caretaker in Brisbane took his budgerigars away in their pockets because he did not have a portable cage -- a whole new dimension to budgie smuggling.

The death-toll from the flash-flooding has risen to 12, but in good news the missing are now down to 48, though with grave fears held for 9 of them, as the news phrase has it. The expected peak has been revised down, which has meant that only 3000-odd homes in Ipswich were inundated rather than 4000. Things are still getting deeper in Brisbane, and will for at least another day.

And yes, there are still snakes in the water, and crocodiles, and now at least one shark.

One of my girlfriends was teasing me because I told her to fill her saucepans with water while they still have guaranteed potable water, but in all seriousness, it's the major difference between getting through the aftermath of a natural disaster with ease and with great annoyance. No one likes having to queue for water! Fingers crossed the desalination plant will mean that most of Brisbane can keep drinking from the tap. Sadly, in some rural areas, it's a 3 minute boil for anything from the tap.

Meanwhile, for you lot up north with friends who have lost goods, a few helpful links:
Fairfax story on dealing with water-damaged electronics drbunsen , who is a real-life techie rather than a journo playing one on the internet, says that you'd be better off following this advice. He's probably right, I only know about paper and textiles!
Good page on dealing with water-damaged documents
And for precious garments and textiles, a conservator's guide that contains many things the layperson can do

It's still flooding ...

My friend i_autumnheart   is in a safe spot in Queensland, and doubtless doing dozens of useful things, because she is terrific and like that. One of them is this map: 


You can see the size of Australia compared to the continental USA. The dark blue line is the normal monsoon zone. The blue and pale blue lines were the original estimates of the flooded and flood-affected (cut off as well as largely underwater) areas, the purple and magenta lines are autumn's updated areas as of this afternoon. The flood-affected area in Queensland alone is already significantly bigger than the state of Texas, the flooded area larger than California. (If you can only think in terms of Europe, check out this link for comparative sizes.) Thanks, anthraxia , for the original link.

Careful viewers will notice there are two other major floods in the country at the moment. If you look down to the bottom left and find Perth, a bit below LA, there is a massive fire near there that has only just been brought under control.

The upside of living in a country of such madness is that people are generally great. It's not just the former Prime Minister, many people have been fabulous with supermarkets giving away stock to local people and strangers continuing to form human chains to help people rescue possessions and stock. The RSPCA put out an alert because they were unable to cope and within two hours people had stepped forward to foster all the excess animals at that time. People who were evac-ing an old caretaker in Brisbane took his budgerigars away in their pockets because he did not have a portable cage -- a whole new dimension to budgie smuggling.

The death-toll from the flash-flooding has risen to 12, but in good news the missing are now down to 48, though with grave fears held for 9 of them, as the news phrase has it. The expected peak has been revised down, which has meant that only 3000-odd homes in Ipswich were inundated rather than 4000. Things are still getting deeper in Brisbane, and will for at least another day.

And yes, there are still snakes in the water, and crocodiles, and now at least one shark.

One of my girlfriends was teasing me because I told her to fill her saucepans with water while they still have guaranteed potable water, but in all seriousness, it's the major difference between getting through the aftermath of a natural disaster with ease and with great annoyance. No one likes having to queue for water! Fingers crossed the desalination plant will mean that most of Brisbane can keep drinking from the tap. Sadly, in some rural areas, it's a 3 minute boil for anything from the tap.

Meanwhile, for you lot up north with friends who have lost goods, a few helpful links:
Fairfax story on dealing with water-damaged electronics drbunsen , who is a real-life techie rather than a journo playing one on the internet, says that you'd be better off following this advice. He's probably right, I only know about paper and textiles!
Good page on dealing with water-damaged documents
And for precious garments and textiles, a conservator's guide that contains many things the layperson can do