Donna Jones
“Originally Seth was a sky god, lord of the desert, master of storms, disorder, and warfare—in general, a trickster,“ – says the Encyclopaedia Britannica when referring to the Egyptian God Seth (AKA Setekh, Setesh, or Set).
And former Tropical Cyclone Seth certainly lived up to being the master of storms and a trickster, when the low pressure system dumped nearly one-and-a-half times Kanigan’s yearly rainfall in the space of a single night.
Forecasters at the Bureau of Meteorology were predicting between 50 and 100mm of rainfall.
Some residents near Woolooga said they received more than 820mm over 33 hours.
Livestock and farm equipment washed away.
More than “hundreds“ of cars were reported as caught in flood waters.
Reports are emerging of a family sheltering two other families in the boat they were towing to escape the flood waters as the water rapidly rose around them.
The Bruce Highway, the main arterial road between Cairns and Brisbane, was cut in multiple places leaving travellers and trucks stranded and cut off.
Goomeri suffered massive infrastructure damage with torn up roads, debris-laden bridges and water inundating the lower areas of the township such as the swimming pool, bowls club and service stations.
One of the major arterials in and out of Woolooga township, the Woolooga Brooweena Road has been decimated now that Running Creek Bridge has washed away.
The only two stores in town, the Woolooga Trader feed barn and the Woolooga Hotel were both completely flooded and damaged, and will most likely be unable to open to customers for a few weeks.
But what happened to create this disaster?
A spokesperson from the Bureau of Meteorology said it comes down to the unpredictability of these types of weather systems.
“Weather systems such as ex-tropical cyclones can intensify very quickly and can produce conditions for very unpredictable and fast-rising flash flooding,“ the spokesperson said.
“The Bureau of Meteorology monitored severe weather over the Wide Bay and Burnett district on Friday 7 January and Saturday 8 January, as a result of the remnants of ex-Tropical Cyclone Seth.
“As ex-Tropical Cyclone Seth moved over the Queensland coast, winds higher in the atmosphere eased, slowing its movement.
“The Bureau issued many warnings throughout the weather event, beginning with a severe thunderstorm storm warning for the area from 2.30pm AEST on Friday for possible heavy rain and thunderstorms.
“Severe thunderstorm and weather warnings remained current throughout Friday night and into Saturday morning, also warning of heavy rain and localised flooding for the Wide Bay and Burnett district,“ the spokesperson said.
