[Vision2020] Massive Cat. 4 Cyclone Yasi Approaches Record Flood Devastated Queensland, Australia

[Ted Moffett]

Joint Typhoon Warning Center graphic data on Cyclone Yasi about to hit
Queensland, Australia:

http://www.usno.navy.mil/NOOC/nmfc-ph/RSS/jtwc/warnings/sh1111.gif

http://www.usno.navy.mil/JTWC/
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Article pasted in lower down on Cyclone Yasi about to hit Queensland, Australia.
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The "Inconvenient Truth" regarding how the devastating flooding
Queensland, Australia has faced recently, which will continue as
Cyclone Yasi hits, is likely connected to human activity accelerating
the Earth's hydrological cycle, increasing the frequency of record
setting flood events, from the Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences:

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/09/28/1003292107

"Satellite-based global-ocean mass balance estimates of interannual
variability and emerging trends in continental freshwater discharge"
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NASA release regarding this scientific study:

NASA Study Sees Earth's Water Cycle Pulse Quickening

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/water20101004.html

Quote from NASA article above:

"Famiglietti said the evaporation and precipitation cycle taught in
grade school is accelerating dangerously because of higher
temperatures fueled by greenhouse gases. Hotter weather above the
ocean causes freshwater to evaporate faster, which leads to thicker
clouds unleashing more powerful storms over land. The resulting
rainfall then travels via rivers to the sea in ever-larger amounts,
and the cycle begins again."
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http://fxnonstop.com/index.php/component/content/article/102580-myart72745

Queensland Braces for `Huge' Cyclone Yasi Just Weeks After Flood Disaster

Residents fill sandbags ahead of Cyclone Yasi in Townsville, Australia.

Photographer: Leigh Turner/Getty Images

The Queensland city of Cairns prepared to evacuate hospitals and urged
residents in low-lying areas to leave as the Australian state braced
for the strongest cyclone since 2006, just weeks after record
flooding.

Cyclone Yasi, expected to strike the coast packing winds of up to 280
kilometers (175 miles) an hour, has forced the closure of 300 schools
and shut mines, ports and railways. Cairns residents are scrambling to
stock up on supplies, with retailers reporting long lines, the
Australian Associated Press reported.

“This storm is huge, and it is life-threatening,” Queensland Premier
Anna Bligh said in Brisbane. “We do have time to prepare, but that
time is now and that time is today.”

The cyclone is expected to be upgraded from a category three storm
today and make landfall early Feb. 3 as “a potentially dangerous
cyclone exceptionally large in size,” according to the Bureau of
Meteorology. It may be more severe than Cyclone Larry, which wiped out
most of Australia’s banana crop and devastated sugar cane fields
almost five years ago.

Two Cairns hospitals will be evacuated today because of the threat of
inundation by floodwaters, Bligh said. The Air Force will assist with
the movement of 255 patients and hospitals in Brisbane are on alert to
provide extra beds, she said.

Tourists in Cairns, the Whitsundays and Townsville, popular centers
for cruises in the Great Barrier Reef, are rushing to board flights
before the storm closes airports, Deutsche Presse- Agentur reported.

Qantas Flights

Qantas Airways Ltd. will operate two extra flights to Brisbane from
Cairns today and provide a bigger plane for a flight to Queensland’s
capital from Townsville, the company said in a statement on its
website.

Qantas budget unit Jetstar said in a statement it will operate seven
additional flights, two from Hamilton Island and five from Cairns,
providing more than 1,200 additional seats to people seeking to leave
the region.

Queensland is beginning a recovery effort estimated to cost at least
A$5 billion ($5 billion) as its economy prepares for slower growth
because of flooding since November, Bligh said Jan. 28. The Australian
state contributes about 19 percent of Australia’s economic output,
producing 80 percent of the country’s coking coal, Treasurer Wayne
Swan said last month.

“Now more is being asked of us,” Bligh said today.

Xstrata, Rio Tinto

Dalrymple Bay Coal Terminal Pty halted operations because of the
threat from Yasi, it said on its website today. Xstrata Plc closed its
Collinsville coal mine in Queensland, while Rio Tinto Group shut its
Hail Creek coal mine in the state.

The Abbot Point coal harbor was due to close at 4 p.m. local time and
the Hay Point harbor, which is still open, isn’t loading any cargoes,
said Mary Steele, a spokeswoman for North Queensland Bulk Ports Corp.,
which manages the two facilities.

Railway operator QR National Ltd. has suspended two Queensland
coal-transport lines. It halted train services on the Newlands line
serving Abbot Point and the Goonyella line serving Hay Point, the
world’s largest port for shipping steelmaking coal, said Mark
Hairsine, a spokesman for the company.

Yasi could cause “significant damage” to sugar cane crops in northern
Queensland if it crosses the coast as a category four cyclone, Steve
Greenwood, chief executive officer of the Brisbane-based producers
group Canegrowers, said by phone.

The storm is forecast to strike the coast south of Cairns, according
to the Bureau of Meteorology, and may affect a region that accounts
for about a third of Australian cane production.

‘Wide Area’ Threatened

“It’s not looking all that positive for those that are going to be
impacted, and it looks like it could be a pretty wide area,” Greenwood
said. “We are talking about a substantial part of the cane-growing
areas.”

Yasi was 1,120 kilometers east of Cairns at 1 p.m. local time and
gradually intensifying, the bureau said.

Townsville advised residents to move away from coastal areas as soon
as possible, according to a statement on the Queensland government
website. Cairns Mayor Val Schier said residents in low-lying areas
were being encouraged to evacuate, the AAP said. “We’re telling anyone
in the low-lying areas they need to be moving today and find another
place to go.”

About 300 schools in north and central Queensland will be closed from
tomorrow, with those in the far north staying shut for the rest of the
week, the Queensland government said in a statement.

Tropical Cyclone Larry in 2006 crossed the north Queensland coast near
Innisfail, south of Cairns, and the heart of Australia’s banana
industry. It caused an estimated A$500 million of damage to
infrastructure and crops, damaging about 10,000 homes and disrupting
road and rail access for several days, the weather bureau said on its
website. It slammed into the Queensland coast as a category four
storm, the second- highest category in the five-grade classification
system.

To contact the reporter on this story: James Paton in Sydney
jpaton4 at bloomberg.net.
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Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett