Australia Floods 2022

Reporting from the thick of it!

This, Day 9, post event, is the first Day that i can get on the internet - but it's 3G - unstable - there's no info as to when it will return.

There's been a lot of damage in the region. 20 lives lost, 20-30 000 homes flooded - thousands of homes destroyed. Records smashed.

My house got through, by a whisker, i was lucky, a lot of damage to the farm's fences.

There's community spirit but part of that spirit includes a simmering anger towards authorities and a sense the region was "abandoned" - that it was left to a DIY rescue service - with no communication.

There are issues about how the experts prepared, then responded, as well as the performance of the biggest Communication carrier (Telstra) in a crisis.

The media, of course, has behaved in its usual way.

Looking forward to providing details on the nature of the storm, and exploring the above issues - if we ever get the internet back on.

Hey hey hey! Glad to hear your not off floating on a log somewhere! That's great that your house made it. I started following all this a bit late in the game, a day or so after your last communication. Some places had, if I remember correctly, over 1,000mm in 24 hours. That's extraordinary.

I'm sure this type of house already exists, but have you considered designing a dwelling that floats in the floods but that you can also anchor to a foundation for hurricanes and tornadoes? And, of, course, it should be fireproof.

Anyway, good to hear from you! I'm looking forward to all the details.

First some pictures - they tell the story best:

[image]

Yesterday i went into Lismore to do my shopping. It's more than two weeks after the event but the devastation is still plain to see. The road flows downstream with the creek. For 30 km's virtually the entire road was underwater - with all houses (except for a few on the hills) flooded. You know that coz the contents of the houses have been turned inside out - it's all in a parade of sad piles along the edge of the road. The farm fences are festooned with thick grass and debris all along the route At a road repair stop i looked at some trees along the creek, you can see the level was 20-30 metres above it's normal level.

Then when you get to Lismore it's mind-boggling. The water has long receded - it goes down pretty fast - but I'd estimate a populated area of the town about 10 x 5 km wide was underwater. Basically the whole town. Some of the trash has been cleared but a lot hasn't - another failing in the response. These people can't start to heal when they still have to look at destruction of their broken lives piled up on the street.

There's a suburb called Goonelabah which is up on the surrounding hills - that was fine - it's where i did the shopping. All the shops i normally go to were flooded and are still closed.

Doing the shopping the feeling of post-trauma was palpable - you could see it in the faces of the people - drained of life - it's like a zombie town with zombie people. I heard some laughter from a couple of little kids - it sounded weird - they don't really know - everyone else looked beaten down, quiet. The clerk told me people were breaking down in tears at the check-out when she asked the standard 'How are you today?' She found herself hugging customers to console them.

One thing i noticed, no-one was wearing masks - like zero people. There were still signs asking you to wear masks and practice social distancing in the supermarket, but they seemed to be from a long-ago world.

In the courtyard area a Aboriginal busker guy with a beautiful country-western voice was singing Imagine there's no heaven

This storm had been in the making for 14 months after a double La Nina - the 2nd declared 6 mths after the first one finished. Wasn’t sure that had happened before but now that i’ve got the internet back on i see it has. El Ninos are one-off events but La Ninas can regenerate within the same cycle. (1998-2001 was the last multiple La Nina - no drama in Aus - you still need that alignment - though there were big floods in Taipei.)

BoM: La Niña occurs when equatorial trade winds become stronger, changing ocean surface currents and drawing cooler deep water up from below. This results in a cooling of the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean (while) piling up warm surface waters in the western Pacific and to the north of Australia. (causing increased evaporation causing increased rain)

The trade winds are the ones that blow through Taiwan - the notorious Dong Bei Ji Fong (NE autumn wind).

This is the fascinating thing about weather - the result is rain (East Aus) - but the cause, aetiologically, is wind in Asia.

So what causes wind?

Nat Geo: Wind is the movement of air caused by the uneven heating of the Earth by the sun. .. Warm equatorial air rises higher into the atmosphere and migrates toward the poles. This is a low-pressure system. At the same time, cooler, denser air moves over Earth’s surface toward the Equator to replace the heated air. This is a high-pressure system. The boundary between these two areas is called a front. The complex relationships between fronts cause different types of wind and weather patterns.

This is a trick of nature. The generating formula is simple - an interaction between roughly circular Highs and Lows which rotate in opposite directions - couldn’t be more basic - but when they brush up against each other - that’s where the magic happens. The weather in the last few decades does seem increasingly erratic - is this collision of hot and cold becoming a self-escalating chain reaction?

Recap: Uneven distributions of hot and cold caused big trade winds - twice - which caused ocean warming north of Australia which produced massive moisture, which fed a low pressure system which was blocked by a stationary high to the south.

As a result of this double La Nina, the ground was saturated before the first drop fell - in fighting parlance - you've softened your opponent up - now for the season-defining knock-out punch.

Edit: Read this morning that the La Nina, which had supposedly peaked and was receding, has now 'stalled'. Hope we're not in a for a third wave. There have been no more torrential downpours but it has continued to rain - almost every day.

The system started to cause havoc Feb 22 on the ironically named Sunshine Coast where the low first formed just off of the coast,just north of Brisbane. It was clear from the beginning this was a serious weather event.

The first problem is it was a cyclone basically – a rotating low powerful enough to draw in significant moisture - but they’re not called that in Aus once they form below the 60 degree lateral. They’re called East Coast Lows instead but nobody even knows that name. For fuck’s sake – call them Cyclones. Dangerous storms need dangerous names.

The other problem with not calling them cyclones is there was no forecast track. That’s crazy. A forecast track is something people can relate to - you can loop it on the news - know exactly who’s in the firing line.

There was also no ‘day-off’ declared for anywhere. There were days off galore after it struck of course coz people were swamped, but no official warning. There were no evacuations prior to the event - not even an SMS warning - nothing. Later authorities would say it was “impossible to predict” and “unprecedented” but that’s total crap.
you could see it coming from 5 days away with a path of destruction along the way
it may have been record breaking but it wasn’t unprecedented - we had floods here a little over a year ago from the same kind of system.

The initial forecast when it first formed was heavy rain north of here – nothing too alarming – 30-60mm – meant to move down the coast/hinterland – impact us the following two days with 2X 20-60’s. Then it‘d fine-up for several days.

I knew from last year that that can balloon out, so did the mowing while I could still get down to the tree paddock, then the shopping the next day (first day of rain here) in a bigger town, 40 minutes drive away. That town, Lismore, is now underwater.
The next day there was more rain around the 100mm mark in my neck of the woods – that’s a lot, but doable. The creek broke its banks for a few hours in one section, nothing serious.

Meanwhile on the Sunshine Coast, they were exceeding forecasts by a wide margin - 700-800 mm in the catchment areas – accumulating over two days. Furthermore, radar showed the system had barely moved overnight. That’s a big red flag.

These low pressure systems usually kiss the east coast then re-curve down to NZ’s south west coast – they are known to pack a punch. People blame the Low but it’s just doing what it does – it’s the High pressure’s fault. A stationary High to the south east – resulting in the dreaded stalled system. If you have one day of 300+ rainfall, you’ve got problems – two days of that is a guaranteed disaster.

Aus is, scandalously, not equipped to deal with this level of rain. There are not the industrial strength drains that you see everywhere in Taiwan - i don't know why. It’s also flatter – which is good and bad – good that you won’t get mudslides usually – the biggest killers in weather events – but bad in terms of water taking longer to run off and spreading out, widening the flood zone.

The damage on the Sunshine Coast was severe. Flooding, a train derailed (a freight train – no one hurt somehow – washed off the tracks), boats, houseboats washed down river, a couple of drownings.

Then it was Brisbane’s turn – same deal – worse if anything. Again, huge 7-800 per day falls in the mountains – over 500 per day in many places - large regions accumulating 1000+, widespread flooding, 6 more dead. The pattern was a lead-in day of big rain, then the mother-lode the following day. The old one-two.

There was some media coverage but it was weird it was not a bigger deal. Considering the over-the-top safety-watch-it stuff with Covid, there seemed very little concern about an unfolding natural disaster. Apart from watching the radar, I found Twitter was a better info source – affected people reporting – uploading pics.

Meanwhile, in northern NSW, we were getting steady feed-out rain from the system but crunch-time kept getting delayed, and going up, first to 50-150, then, the night before, it jumped to 150-250. Turned out it was still a huge underestimation. Which is strange coz it ended up being a carbon copy of what it had been over the previous 4-5 days, slightly more intense.

By Sunday Feb 27, it had been raining heavily in the Northern Rivers region for several days (well 14 mths actually). I’d gone to bed the night before thinking ‘tonight could be the night’ but it wasn’t. When I woke up Sunday the creek had broken its banks. Not up to where it was in the Dec 2020 flood (which my neighbour said was higher than Cyclone Debbie in 2017), but close.

By lunchtime it was at that level. Whereas the 2020 peak came and went relatively quickly, this was sustained. I estimated it had another three metres to go before it swamped the house. With it still pouring, that seemed a likely scenario. I’d already moved some stuff prone to water damage off the floor the previous day but then i moved everything i could. It was raining continuously, with some heavy falls patterned in - typical of an approaching typhoon where you’re in the oncoming outstream.

By late afternoon it was beyond 2020 - i estimated `1-2m below house level. Then the wind picked up. Then it got dark. That adds a new layer. Now you know the creek is rising but you can’t see it. What prep could be done was done. I called an old Taiwan veteran (now living on the Gold Coast) for a chat and a drink coz it was reminiscent of the ‘here goes’ spirit of an impending typhoon. We kept it pretty moderate - i was fully expecting that i would need to react to water in the house somewhere in the next several hours.

That night, Feb 27-28, it raged all night. Windy, pouring, the corrugated iron flapping loudly on the timber pile shed. I went to bed at 12 but that wasn’t gonna work. Got up at 2.30, flashed the torch out to see if the water was approaching. Not within the torch-range of 20 feet anyway. Kept checking the radar – looking for some hint of relief – but it was piling in - we were right in the firing line.

Daylight on Feb 28 was vaguely cheering coz you can see again – I was impressed that I’d gotten that far. But it was still pouring - the radar saying more to come.

Twitter had photos, footage of Lismore – it was going under.

Then we lost the internet. Then the power. My house is nestled in a horseshoe bend of the creek - by now a channel had opened up from the northern section right through to the southern part cutting across the horseshoe at the top. It was within a few feet of the house. The height of the creek relative to the house was down to a few cms left. The creek banks are about 20m high, then there's a natural flood plain about 200m wide and another bank of about 5 m - so capable of taking a large volume of water. But if it breaches that then it's as flat as a pancake all the way to the house.

Several fraught hours later, around 1.30pm, the rain began to ease. Even without the radar i knew the danger to my house was over. I’m reasonably high upstream, so don’t have to worry about any delayed flow down effect. But Lismore does. My creek (and others) flow into the Wilson River which flows through Lismore. For sure they were going to me smashed.

The creek went down relatively quickly once the rain eased. By the next day it was back within its banks. I took a walk around the property to survey the damage. It was as i expected - any fences facing the oncoming flood were flattened tangled messes of debris - weeks of work to repair. I'd planted 400 trees along the banks of the creek to regenerate - they'd all gone fully under but most survived. Some of the bigger ones were flattened but could still be straightened and re-staked. My access road was cut off (for several days), but that was kind of a moot point coz all regional roads were cut beyond that anyway. I had plenty of food (and water!), so that was ok.

Of course i was incredibly lucky to still have a house (and my life) and i can imagine the soul destroying devastation that those who lost everything must feel. But lucky and feeling chipper are not the same thing. After 36hrs living on the edge, no sleep, and then the repair work all in front of you - you do feel drained.

It was another 2 days before the electricity came back on - but still no internet (that would remain out for 10 days!!! - i’ll get to that later). The TV media, which had totally missed the glaring warning signs, was now pumping out destruction porn from Lismore - in between ads for insurance companies, fat/sugar, alcohol, Telstra, and gambling.

Infuriatingly, they wouldn’t show the radar or any hard meteorological data re the system. Having missed all the warning signs, it was now all about pumping up fear across NSW after the horse has bolted, warning of more rain to come in hard hit areas - but that was only to hold viewers and increase advertising revenue.

Next i want to look at how woeful the response has been from an array of institutions whose job it was/is to respond.

Govt arms of disaster mitigation/warning/response agencies - in one of the highest taxed countries in the known universe, Telstra (private internet provider) (The electricity guys did a good job - in my area at least - 2 days was good going) considering)
Why did these systemic failures in leadership happen?
Why a drawn out investigation held by the people/organizations who caused the failures is not the way forward.

The floods are an example of how fucked-up the modern system of expertism has become.

Australia is way too top-heavy with experts.

They're great at having meetings, training retreats, producing endless reams of media about listening to the experts to justify their own highly-paid (from the people's purse) existences.

But when it comes to the crunch: MIA (Missing in Inaction is more like it)

Useless.

Worse than useless, as we'll see later ...

We're currently experiencing an unusually high volume of calls right now due to a severe weather event. Good luck - please stay safe - and remember to practice social distancing whilst on the roof.

[image]

The SES (State Emergency Services) is NSW’s frontline Disaster Response organization (not to be confused with the SAS, which is Australia’s frontline war-crimes crack squad). If there’s an emergency rescue situation then call Triple Zero, the SES will come to save you. Unless we’re experiencing a high-volume of calls right now … then you’ll get Triple Zero response.

The overriding theme of the first-hand reports from local residents say:

we were abandoned - the system failed us

In the initial rush to rescue people as Sunday-Monday (Feb 27-28) unfolded, there was a flotilla of boats involved – you can see it in the pictures - all but 2 of these were civilians! That’s DIY rescue. It’s great that people responded – but in a country paying some of the highest taxes in the world, you gotta wonder where were all the experts when we needed them?

Worse, the two SES boats refused to conduct operations after 6pm - due to Health and Safety Protocols. WTF? You’re a rescue service – if you’re not prepared to go into a dangerous situation coz its getting dark, what’s the point of you? Luckily civilians in their tinnies kept going into the night.

Worse than useless: The SES monopolises communications. If you’re in an emergency, you’re told to call the emergency number: 000. Here we have people who’ve clamboured up onto their rooves, huddled together in the pouring rain, with the river rising fast - so a full-on emergency. For those able to get a telephone signal they were told by a Robot:

Emergency Triple Zero in New South Wales is extremely busy due to extreme weather conditions. If you require Police, Fire or Ambulance attendance (which you don’t - maybe ambulance when the flood recedes to collect your corpse) please stay on the line. (for God knows how long - doesn't matter coz they can't help anyway)

For State Emergency Service call 132 500, for non-emergency police assistance call 131 444.

ABC: But when they rang the SES number, they were met with another recorded message telling them they would receive a call-back. For the majority, that vital call-back took several hours, even days.

Days. If you’re stranded on your roof in a rising flood - days ain’t gonna cut it. Remember, that’s only to get a call back from a human - that’s not to get rescued or anything useful.

The tragedy is: we’ve got normal people ready, willing and able to do the rescues, who are being denied access to the communication centre for people in critical need of being rescued.

With no internet as a work-around. That leaves you with hollering.

Ironically, in the taxpayer funded PR ads from SES, the motto is:

If it’s flooded forget it.

Seems like it was the Government’s rescue motto (and Telstra’s) as well.

[image]

A month later, to the day, we've got a very similar situation building:

Low Pressure system drawing in massive moisture from an overheated Coral Sea to the NE and unloading on the hinterland around the Qld/NSW border. With a blocking High to the SE.

It's crazy that these systems aren't simply called Cyclones - then we'd have a track - there'd be a Cyclone Day-off declared - people could be given evacuation options - at least people would be alerted.

Later, our hapless authorities will again say it was 'unprecedented' - even though it happened a month ago - plus a bunch of times before that.

The blocking High is not as imposing this time - currently - with luck, a weakness develops so it can move through a bit quicker. If that doesn't happen, we're looking at an action replay. Even if it does, some areas in this region will be flooded.

Will be watching the rain totals/radar very closely. Today & tomorrow will tell the story.

[image]

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

Optimistically, i'm hoping that it moves through fast - but the line of rain stretching up the coast is moving down vertically - it's not a front that goes past - it keeps feeding in for the full length. Anywhere in the path of that is set for a scary night.

The system is moving south, hugging the coast, maybe creeping inland, which is not good. The 'eye' would be just right of the radar centre in Brisbane.

Totals since 9am are over 100ml (at 8pm)- those places can expect another 100-200 mil overnight. Then more tomorrow.

Some places hit 200 yesterday. Another drowning - a couple missing.

Brisbane radar, 128km

[image]

Mar 29, the next morning:

Poured all night here but short of torrential. Seems we dodged the machine-gun hail of bullets this time. The heaviest rain fell right on the coast (300+), which is the opposite of last time when it fell on the hinterland. This also helps in terms of river flooding coz there's less to come down through the system.

As hoped for, it did move through quicker than the last on, which is what saved us.

System is still tracking down the coast but should be only big rain rather than the full-scale disaster.

Edit: 358mm was the top recorded - at Coplicks Bridge (on the Gold Coast).

[image]

Holy fuck - I thought the storm was on the move south but it's stayed stationary overnight - if anything it's moved slightly back to the north.

The result has been another night of heavy rain. That's here. In Lismore it's been torrential. It's now 8am, Mar 30. Since 9am yesterday they've had another 420mm! That's gonna cause fresh floods for sure.

Another reason why we need a Cyclone track. With the radar you can say where the storm is and get a general impression of where it's going (from past movement) but without the pressure readings you really don't know.

The SES, which bungled the original storm response a month ago, were more proactive this time in that they ordered evacuations for low lying areas of Lismore for the previous night (Mar28-29). Tragically, they gave the 'all-clear' for residents to return last night - whereupon they've had 420mm of rain!

My neighbour says they've reordered evacuations at 3am this morning - but that's too late. How are people supposed to evacuate in the middle of the night with floods already happening? What a colossal fuck up.

Doesn't look that dramatic on the radar but if you're in the stream of the yellow/red and bear in mind that's it's remained stationary, then it quickly adds up.

[image]

Photo of fresh flooding in Lismore - photo Ella Buckland

[image]

News: According to Richmond Labor MP Justine Elliot, whose electorate covers flood zones including Ballina, Byron Bay, Mullumbimby and Tweed Heads, Lismore was the only region to receive official SES weather warnings.

Remember even that warning for Lismore was rescinded before the floods came and evacuees were sent home.

Ms Elliot claims her electorate “urgently” needs evacuation centres in Byron Bay and Ballina as the situation escalates.

Video of Byron Bay flooding.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1508933364669050881

According to Bom the 'non-cyclone' that looks, feels, acts like a cyclone will continue to drift north, then move out to sea tomorrow. We'll see.

For some reason the rain seems to crank up at night. If it's lingering on the coast tonight then there will be places still getting pounded to the south west of the 'eye'.

Wind has picked up.

[image]

Wow. You all have been through the ringer so far this year.

Reuters did a story on this round of storms.

There was no official warning that the levee had been breached after sirens malfunctioned, local media reported.

Yeah... that's not good. You kind of want those things working.

Storms are continuing to the south around Sydney - different system but still La Nina enhanced. Not in the same league as we've seen but still totals above 100mm per day, for 2-3 days. That should be manageable - in Taiwan it's normal Mei-yu rain (plum rains) - water off a duck's back. In Australia, due to its inferior mitigation-infrastructure, it's a flooding event.

Not surprisingly, but worryingly, the experts, having failed abysmally twice - in one month when it counted, for the Big Ones - have now begun issuing evacuation orders left-right-and-centre.

This is what they really love doing (besides cover-up investigations): enforcing public control measures.

Not doing anything practical to mitigate the problem, coz that would involve fixing it, which is too much trouble, besides, we're incredibly busy covering-up Covid - so now's not the right time.

At least it's a change from the stay-at-home orders, i guess.

Apart from the risks associated with over-abusing evacuation orders, they're easy for the Issuer to issue, but it's another thing for the Issuee to suddenly have to leave home to find alternative accommodation.

The new orders read - this is one i've randomly checked checked now for a ref:

SES: If you remain in the area after 3:00pm Friday 8 April 2022 you may be trapped without power, water and other essential services and it may be too dangerous to rescue you.

Forget about the may be part - you'll be totally abandoned - you can bank on that.

In fact, the current evacuations are nothing more than bureaucratic over-reactions to the previous bungles. The weather forecast for Sydney today (where the orders are in place) is for 8-20mm of rain. Hardly Noah's Ark territory.

[image]

Telstra-robot: Hi, welcome to Telstra. We are currently experiencing an unusually high-volume of calls with wait times up to an hour. Have you tried contacting us on the My Telstra app? Wait times can be reduced by up to 4 times. I’m now sending you a link to My Telstra app. If you would still like to hold the line for the next available operator say Yes.

Yes.

I’m sorry I didn’t quite catch that?

Yes.

Thank-you. I have found an account registered to the number you called on – is this the account about which you are inquiring today?

Yes.

Are you calling in relation to a 5G NBN plan or a 3g and 4g mobile telephone service?

Mobile.

Have you been impacted by the recent severe weather events?

Yes.

So that we may best serve you, in a few words, say what you are calling
about.

Internet Outage

I didn’t quite catch that - that’s ok - I’ll connect you to an operator. Please hold the line – the expected wait time is 5 to 15 minutes.

(elevator music punctuated every minute by:)

When you call us from the My Telstra app your call will be answered up to four times faster. Or simply click on the Get Help link on My Telstra app to trouble-shoot most problems.

Hi Dulan, my name is Rolland, how may we help you today?

Hi Roland, i...

Dulan, this conversation is being recorded for training purposes, are you ok with that?

Yes, good idea.

Thank you Dulan.

Is it ok if i record too?

Sure.

Thank you Rolland.

So how may we assist you today Dulan?

Yeah, we’ve had a severe weather event, the internet has been out for 7 days - i’ve called uhr, the last three days, the answer is always technicians are working on it - it will be back on within 24hrs - but that’s not been correct information. So we’d like to know
(a) What damage was done to Telstra’s infrastructure, exactly?
(b) What are the technicians doing to fix it?
(c) When’s it gonna be fixed?

Dulan, I’m sorry to hear about your circumstances. I can’t find your details here - we’ve sent you an email with a file number, can you open that while we’re on the line and give me that identity code?

Mate, i don’t have the internet. That’s why i’m calling. There was a big flood - it’s been out for seven days. I can’t give you an identity code. You have my name, my date of birth, my telephone number, what …

Yes, but i’m just having trouble locating you on the computer. So you recently applied for a 5G connection and it hasn’t been connected yet, is that correct?

No, it’s not. The internet is out - for seven days - yes there was a storm, but i lived in Taiwan for 23 years through typhoons & earthquakes, it didn’t go out at all - so we don’t know what’s going on. We need some answers.

Yes, I understand. So you didn’t apply for a 5G wifi connection to your house recently?

No.

I think i know what the problem is Dulan - you’ve been accidentally routed through (by a fucking robot) to the 5G connection department. You need to speak to the internet outage department.

Yes, I do.

I’m so sorry Dulan to hear of your situation - i will put you through to the right department now - please hold the line.

(Elevator muzak)

Robot: When you call us from the My Telstra app your call will be answered up to four times faster. Or simply click on the Get Help link on My Telstra app to trouble-shoot most problems.

Good lord. My blood boiled just reading this. Is that really something like a conversation you had?

Telstra: (inaudible), how may i help you today?

(phone is on speaker - cleaning house as a filler-activity - dash to pick up)
Hello …?

Hi, is that Dulan?

Yes, sorry i missed your name.

Alicia

Hi Alicia.

Dulan, in order to confirm your identity, for security purposes can you please say your full-name and date of birth?

Dulan Drift **** (redacted!!!)

And your address there?

****
Thank you, so how can we help you today, Dulan?

(repeat story - add:)

The situation is we feel like we’ve been abandoned. There’s no sign of anyone official doing anything, including Telstra. If no-one's doing anything, people need the internet to co-ordinate so they can do it themselves.

Yes, I understand your situation, Dulan, I'm looking at the computer now, there is an outage in your area. Due to a severe weather event.

Yep, we know that. But what was the damage exactly? What’s being done to fix it? When's it really coming back on? This is 7-days of out and counting.

I’m checking that information for you now, just bear with me…

Sure.

(computer keyboard clattering)

Yes, there was a scheduled outage on Feb 28 for 48 hrs …

A scheduled outage - what does that mean?

Then as you said, on Mar 3 when you first called, that was changed to severe weather event, and the estimated time for restoration was entered as 24 hrs, which was, ahr, was updated a further 24 hrs on the 4th, then, ahr, on the 5th it was updated to 36 hrs.

None of that information was correct btw - for training purposes.

These are just estimates, so it was correct information at the time it was given.

No it wasn't. It was ...

And.. today now your district has been updated to ‘indefinite’.

Indefinite? So Telstra’s answer after 7-days is: ‘Dunno’?

No, it’s not that Telstra doesn’t know, the technicians file 24 hr updates, this is just what they’ve written in for today.

Ok, can i speak to one of those technicians? Or anyone who does know? Coz all i’m hearing from Telstra so far is disinformation.

It’s not disinformation. The technicians are aware of an outage in your district - but they are very busy working to resolve the problem - they don’t have time to come to the phone.

Funny thing is, I can see the tower from my house, it’s still standing. I’m looking at it now. There’s no helicopters flying technicians in - no-one working on it busily or otherwise. I keep checking with the binoculars - there’s no-one there.

Due to severe weather, as well as Covid protocols, the technicians are working remotely.

Remotely?

Yes.

Doing what?

They’re working on multiple issues.

Such as?

I don't have access to that information. I can only tell you what’s coming up on the screen.

Sure. Can i speak to someone who does have access to the information? Telstra can’t just take away the internet when people need it most - say indefinite … not give an answer why.

I have given you an answer, but if you like, I could escalate your inquiry to …

Yes please.

Just hold the line for a moment, Dulan, i will discuss your matter with The Group. It will take a few minutes.

That’s fine - thank you Alicia.

(no muzak - 2 minutes later)

Hi Dulan, sorry to keep you waiting.

No problem.

I’ve discussed your case with The Group and was informed that we can’t escalate in cases of a severe weather event.

What? Why not?

Because it’s a severe weather event. It’s an evolving situation. The technicians are…

That’s a non-answer. The severe weather event was 7 days ago … What damage did it do?

The technicians are doing everything they can to restore the …

I don‘t think they are. I don’t think they’re doing anything except spreading disinformation - this is… (talking over each other)

Ok, Alicia, you talk first.

There has been a severe weather event, I have correctly given you the information I have on the screen - we understand your situation - we request you to please be patient and wait for the Outage Completion.

Wait for The Completion?

Yes. We are very sorry for the inconvenience.

So, the answer is no answer.

No, the answer is the technicians are working on it remotely - we ask you to patiently wait for Completion.

(stunned silence)

Was there anything else I could help you with today?

What?

Was there anything else I could help you with today?

The above call was Day 7 - i didn’t call again after that. It was futile. You’re not feeling great already dealing with the damage, trudging through the sludge - you don’t need to have your face rubbed in your own powerlessness by Telstra to start each day.

It finally flickered back on in a patchy way on the 11th day. Telstra called to say everything was fine maybe Day 12-13 - the call dropped out literally as the guy was telling me it was fine. He called back but hung up after two rings - i missed it - pressed call back - but it was straight back to the lowest of the low robo-rungs again. Fuck that. That’s the last I’ve heard from Telstra.

In fact, it doesn’t matter whether you get to speak to a person or not - the people (offshore call centre) are, well-trained, at reading off a script - that’s been refined by The Algorithm (see Dan’s novel) from all the calls recorded for training purposes.
They’re bio-bot voices, basically. Telstra could save even more money by ending you at the initial robo-response:

Welcome to Telstra! We’re currently experiencing a high volume of faceless corporate greed, so you could save time by going to fuck yourself now. Thanks for all the money. Good-bye.

The sole purpose of the offshore operator is to serve as an impenetrable buttress between the customer and management. I don’t blame the operator at all - I blame the mega-salaried managers.
Never did get an answer to any of my questions. Still don’t know what the problem was exactly - there was nothing in the media.

I assume: gross incompetence by the experts at a minimum. Infested by Health Safety (new normal) Protocols culture - which amounted to: fuck all

Trouble is: Telstra is one of the biggest sponsors of commercial media out there - so forget about getting any investigative reporting on their colossal failure to deliver in a time of crisis.

Ain’t gonna happen.

Even the publicly-funded ABC won’t cover it coz they’re afraid it may lead to vaccine hesitancy/covid conspiracies (now not being the right time to question the experts etc).

That leaves us with another powerful, faceless, unaccountable corporation (Telstra) - over which we have zero control as a normal person.

11 Days is the longest i’ve been without the internet since i first logged on in 96-97. That’s having lived through major typhoons, earthquakes in Taiwan - huge disasters - somehow - the internet stayed on. So why is Australia, a wealthy country, so far behind at Disaster Preparedness for its citizens?

That got me thinking about the fragility of the internet. Like everyone, it’s formed an integral part of my life. It’s not some add-on like it was in the 90's, it’s an essential service. I’d taken it’s thereness for granted - like The Sun is there - so it was an eye-opener when it was suddenly withdrawn indefinitely due to ... we don't know...

We're not allowed to know.

(Side question: I feel sad when i don't have the internet, but am i happier than i was before i knew the internet existed?)

This probably should be flagged for giving away state military secrets, but - pssst … if you want to knock out Australia’s internet for 11 days - you don’t need any of your fancy cyber-war hacking - just sneeze loudly.

If they ever do fix it, sneeze again.

If Australia got into a war with China tomorrow - the internet would go out (indefinitely) in the first five minutes.

Scheduled time of Completion: When the war is over (either way).

That is a real proposition - pretty sure people in Australia are not ready for that. (Btw, shelves at the big retailers would empty overnight coz it’s mostly made in China - including the shelves - which is another reason why i don't think Aus would support Taiwan in the mythical WW3 scenario.)

The internet is a double-edged sword.

One side: the data-centralization power that elites crave

The other: an alternative source of information/communication for humans - able to bypass MSM

If you then take that away - it’s like being rounded up and sent back to the lowest of the low of Plato’s caves to watch TV - after you’ve escaped that.

I know - coz i experienced it. Married at First Sight (MAFS) Reality TV shows, vacuous news delivered by vacuous, inaccessible Celebrities, sponsored by Telstra, Gambling, Alcohol, Insurance companies, McDonald's, Furniture/hardware stores, and Covid Safe.

A neat insight into the Aussie Model: Don’t spend money on prevention measures, simply buy expensive insurance for your entire life! Then go to Harvey Norman/Bunnings to replace it when it gets destroyed. Everyone makes a buck!

Meanwhile: get drunk, vaccinated, fat, and responsibly gamble your money back to us. (But Don't Smoke! Not weed, or normal cigarettes!)

If, during a war for example, we are forced back onto MSM (newspapers/TV/radio) for gleaning our version of reality … we’re fucked.

It’s not hard to see how switching the internet off for a while in select locations could be seen as a tool for preventing disinformation - during a time of crisis - by those protecting us

- for the common good -

It's happening again believe it or not. 280 mm of rain overnight at Killarney, about 70 kms from here. Lotta places over 150. Big falls on Brisbane inland, Sunshine Coast where they've been hit for several days in a row - they had up to 200 mil a few days ago, then 150-200 again in past 24 hrs with torrential rain again today - places already over 100 since 9am. Biggest falls around the mountains.

So far it's been ok here, 20-30 mil overnight, but it's hit or miss so that could change. The water table is currently the same height as the earth table so any rain will be amplified. I'm hopeful it will stay west as it moves south, but there's no guarantee. With no tracking product from BoM and pressure charts only updated once every 24hrs, you don't really know - only watch the radar, see where it's vaguely heading.

Looking at it on the sat it's clearly another East Coast Low - also not known as, but should be - Cyclone.

The rotating system on the coast of Brisbane is a split off from a huge system which was on the coast of north Qld a couple of days ago (200mm falls) - that's heading east as you can see on the sat - while a new ECL has sprung up in the same spot as the previous two and is now gaining strength and doing it's own thing. There are places getting smashed again today - this is an unfolding situation.

[image]

This spring in Japan has been pretty much a 180 from last spring. This year, cool, and lots of rain. Some parts of Japan are getting 250+ mm in 24 hours today and tomorrow. I haven't lived here long enough to know if this is unusual or last spring was, and I'm too lazy to check the data, but I'm guessing this is wetter than usual. The plum rains hit this area in June/July.

This spring in Japan has been pretty much a 180 from last spring. This year, cool, and lots of rain. Some parts of Japan are getting 250+ mm in 24 hours today and tomorrow.>

250mm is a lot of rain in any man's language. I seem to remember a few years ago southern areas of Japan had a severe meiyu season that caused floods and landslides.

Meanwhile the system here is hanging around with the biggest rain to the north west of Brisbane. We've been spared anything serious here so far. It does appear to have weakened somewhat in the last 6 hrs - we'll se what happens overnight.

The talk is that the La Nina will continue into winter. There does seem to be masses of moisture around for any system to pick up.

On the other side of the world there's a severe drought in Ethiopia.

As discussed, La Nina is caused by trade winds, which are caused by differences between hot and cold air - i wonder if the Arctic melting contributes to that hot-cold dynamic?

[image]

Looking at the sat images this morning i think we can say the system has broken up and it's over.

Hopefully it's over for the season - and for many many seasons to come. It's time for somewhere-the-fuck-else to feel the sting of climate change for a while.

Paul Harding, Goodna (west of Brisbane): As soon as day 10 hit, everything was gone, everything just stopped.

Food drops stopped without notice, there was a portaloo on the street and it was taken away, and no-one gave us the heads-up. You don't hear anything. You don't know what's going on. You don't know what the next step is.

[You] definitely feel abandoned. I think everyone in Goodna is feeling that way.

There are 15 houses in the street — there's only three of them occupied at the moment. The adrenaline has worn off, the positivity has worn off. It's very hard to stay motivated … that 'yes, we can get through this' — it's all starting to eat away at you mentally.

Svea Pitman, Mullumbimby: I'm a single mum. I struggled to get out of the rental market and now I own a home I can't live in.

Since then we've moved to a converted shed, an Airbnb, we spent six days in a tent over Easter because there was nowhere to put us at all.

I've just managed to extend my home loan to get a motorhome and I'm now living in the gutter outside the front of my old house. I've cried every day for 100 days.

I've noticed since moving back to Aus, if you don't live in a big city, you don't count.

You find you're paying sky-high 1st-world prices for basic services, but getting 3rd-world delivery. The roads are full of giant potholes (that's even before the floods), electricity, internet goes out at the drop of a hat - with no explanation except a robo-telephone response telling you:
the estimated time of restoration is: unknown

That's a giant fuck-you from the authorities. Since the floods, the internet has been out twice more, and the electricity has gone off twice - for extended periods. Services are getting progressively whittled down but meanwhile prices are going up!

ABC: Rain, wind, storms and machinery have all impacted the Essential Energy power lines connecting Tottenham, Tullamore and Trundle, leaving the towns without electricity 10 times in the past year.

Gary Brown: It used to take a few hours to go out and now it's almost immediately when the power goes out, the phones and internet go out. We can't dial triple-0. We can't dial anything. We've got nothing. You can't get an ambulance or you can't get a fire brigade.

Firstly, i was wrong. Thought it would take much longer for the investigation to be held. But wasn't wrong about what it would find - lots of taxpayer dollars spent on incompetent experts - all of whom went MIA when they were needed. Here is some of the testimony

SES (State Emergency Service) Commissioner Carlene York was asked why civilians were told not to conduct flood rescues in their own boats.

SES/Carlene York: There is rubble, refuse, very swift-flowing water, contaminated water. Going out is very dangerous so I have an obligation to try and keep the community safe.

Keep the community safe?! Not only did you withhold public-owned life-saving resources, but you tried to stop normal people from doing rescues of stranded community members. Make no mistake, many people would have died if not for the Tinnie Army- who thankfully ignored the experts. (pictured)

Mark Hutchings, NSW Maritime: Operating in flood waters is the most dangerous, perilous thing that you can do. As a government agency you would not recommend, nor would you deploy, untrained staff in inappropriate vessels into that environment.

What a load of deflective crap. For a start, this was not a white-water canyon situation - it's a flood-plain flood. The water inexorably rises but it's not a rushing torrent beyond the river or creek itself - it's overflow water - it's relatively calm - more like a lake - as you can see in the picture.
Yes, there are risks, the water was polluted with sewerage, due to other government failings, but away from the actual river, the conditions are such that a sensible person/fisherman can handle in an emergency. None of the rescuers lost their lives. They saved a bunch.

But sadly, this is what it has come to in the experts-gone-mad world we live in. The head of the emergency rescue services saying we couldn't possibly go out in dangerous conditions! We only do govt-approved non-dangerous disasters and brochure-writing. We're great at brocure-writing! Would you like one?

[image]

9 News: Resilience NSW is set to be scrapped and its commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons stood down as the state government overhauls its emergency response network.

Resilience NSW is an agency set up after the 2019-20 Black Summer bushfires to coordinate emergency services and their disaster management. The agency has a $777 million budget.

So, a publicly funded investigation after the bushfires (which were themselves caused by disastrous management from the experts when 'fuel-reduction burns' blew out of control) resulted in a further $777 bil being spent on setting up yet another incompetent layer of management.

A report by former police commissioner Mick Fuller and chief scientist Mary O'Kane has been handed down after the inquiry and recommended Resilience NSW be shut down because it's ineffective

Classic Aussie-style. An expensive, public-funded bureaucracy of experts set-up to tell everyone what to do - who end up being totally useless in a 'real-world' situation - and in fact make everything much worse.

Chris Minns: The evidence is overwhelming at this point that the massive bureaucracy that is Resilience NSW being placed on top of our emergency services has not worked.

No-one gets held accountable of course. Yes Fitzsimmons will be paid out, then promoted sideways - but that's not accountability. How about the idiots who setup Resilience NSW in the first place? This is what happens when the system reigns supreme - no-one is ever at fault.

[image]
Shane Fitzsimmons - Aussie fat cat

Here's the real worrying part:

The report also recommended a fifth deputy commissioner position to be created within NSW Police to focus on responding to and recovering from natural disasters.

Kevin Morton, police association: It makes a lot of sense putting police at the front and centre of disaster management.

No, it doesn't make sense! Australia is already a de facto police state - they don't need more power. The police were nowhere to be seen during the floods - unless you count setting up speed cameras in flood affected areas.

[image]

It's not complicated. We simply need a normal, functioning, emergency response unit. Fit, able bodied people who are not going to shit their pants when faced with an emergency. Otherwise, do nothing and stay the fuck out of the way. Give the $777 mil per year to normal people doing the DIY rescues, and the victims.

Another cyclone (that we're not allowed to call cyclones) has popped up in the same spot as the others - just off the Sunshine Coast or north Brisbane. It would be so simple to produce a forecast track map that could warn people but BoM, for unknown reasons, refuses to do that. I think they like to keep their data secret - they feel more powerful that way.

The normal path is they move south then at some point recurve towards NZ. The eye looks to be over the Gold Coast right now -remember Lows rotate clockwise in southern hemisphere.

Ground is so sodden that even 100-150 mm could cause serious flooding, especially if it happens in a torrential burst.

Current status is steady rain, not torrential. Hope it stays that way. I don't want to lose the internet for another 11 days.

[image]

Rained solidly for over 24 hours but sans the torrential burst that pushes you over the top. We got about 150mm - areas near here hit 240. It's all to do with the blocking high - whereas the Feb cyclone was blocked and snail-paced its way across us, this one went at normal speed. Was worried about the stock fences running down to the creek but although they've buckled a bit, they're mostly still standing.

[image]

The Big Wet circus has moved south, where it appears to be aided by untimely dam-releases. This is not close to the first time this has been done at the height of big-rain in Aus - with bad consequences. The net-effect, unsurprisingly, is to amplify a deluge into a disaster.

Check out this footage. From the current floods in mid-west NSW Looks like a raging brook during a typhoon in Taiwan, but it's not. It's portrayed in some media like it is from the rain - but there was only 100 mil - this is a dam-release - unleashed onto village residents.

Surely, whoever's (not) in control of dam-release decisions could look at the weather report. Big-rain coming - better let off some water before it hits.

No doubt there's some tangled bureaucratic reasoning for not doing that - but it's gotta be fixed - as a mitigating measure - quite a simple one that would avoid flooding people's homes with a destructive wall-of-water.

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/video/dramatic-video-of-wyangala-dam-spilling-230-000-megal...

That's some incredible footage. Yeah, you'd think with that much energy at stake, somebody would be in better control.

9 News: An angry Eugowra resident has confronted NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet over the state's emergency response to the flood disaster. Peter Jones watched his family and friends get rescued after being swept away in the "wall of water" which hit the town.

Jones confronted Perrottet about what he says was a lack of warning, lack of emergency response and lack of telecommunications available when the town was hit by floodwaters. There was a long period when residents couldn't contact police and coordinate where help was needed.

Jones: We had no food, no clothing, no one telling them what was going to happen next because no one was here. What's your answer to some of them before I keep going?

Perrottet: Whatever we can do to make sure that is fixed, we'll do that.

What crap. It's a carbon copy response to what Northern Rivers residents got back in Feb-Mar i.e zero. Despite all the reviews, the mea culpas, the excuses, promises to be better leaders going forward - it's still the same. Don't forget that Australians pay amongst the highest taxes in the world - but what do we get for it when the shit hits the fan? Nothing. Well nothing but a money sink-hole of bureaucratic uselessness.

The fact that there was no warning is criminal. The wall of water was from a dam release - not the rain - so an official flooding of the town - but still no warning ...?! Unfortunately it's another one of those New Normal crimes where no one ever gets held to account.

I remember touring around with my chainsaw after Nepartak in Taidong to help clear-up when i saw the army arrive to help at the school for mentally disabled in Taidong city - it made my eyes fill with tears to see them come in a time of real need. It's not like that in Aus, sadly. The tears are all from desolation, abandonment.

[image]

They're so smart the insurance companies - after the recent spate of floods across Australia they have identified all those areas as no-go zones for insurance. Those who had policies have been told they cannot be renewed.

Insurance rep: Going forward we will focus exclusively on insuring people in safe city suburbs that will likely never need to be paid out. At the end of the day insurance is a business, and with business climate-change due to Covid, where corporation are making record profits, we need to adjust to this new normal.

https://www.9news.com.au/national/australia-breaking-news-today-latest-updates-live-nov...

Home insurance is a racket for the most part. Not entirely. Insurance does have its place, certainly. But it can also be a racket.

Here's an example. When we bought a house in Florida, for cash mind you, I, for some stupid reason, thought it prudent to buy insurance, and so I did. It cost maybe $1,000/year, maybe a little more. Good deal for peace of mind I thought!

Well, come the second year, I got a letter from the company that they were canceling my policy unless I fixed XY and Z on our house, all expensive jobs. Granted, they took my initial money without taking a look, then canceled the policy. Fucking bastards. That's a racket.

Home insurance only maters if it's ongoing. Of course it will pay off for the insurer if they cancel the policy after one year. Fool me once...

Holy shit. Lismore was the town that got a lot of coverage in the international media. I thought you might be close to it. That image of the cow is fucking amazing, as are the others.

One thing i noticed, no-one was wearing masks - like zero people. There were still signs asking you to wear masks and practice social distancing in the supermarket, but they seemed to be from a long-ago world.

This is one thing I wondered about. I assumed covid would now be like a, "What? Who gives a shit about covid?" sort of detail. Absurd, isn't it, that the government cares so much about covid, but not the flood. Rather, with covid, words are cheap and rules are basically words that require you to do something. But now, you need the govt. to do something.

How sad.

RSS Feed of thread

Formosahut forum

Australia Floods 2022 (General)

The Damage Done

La Nina

The build-up

The Deluge

The Experts fail again

The Experts fail again - SES

New Storm

New Storm

New Storm

New Storm - New Floods

New Storm - Byron Floods

New Storm - Byron Floods

New Storm - Evacuation orders

Telstra

Telstra

Telstra 2

Telstra 3

Fragility of the Internet

3rd Event

3rd Event

3rd Event

3rd Event - it's over

The aftermath

The Investigation

The Investigation - Findings

Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day

Dam Release footage

Dam Release footage

Dam Release flooding

Insurers refuse to insure

Insurers refuse to insure

The Damage Done