Cyclones like Wilma leave plenty of damage. Photo / Doug Sherring
I've just returned from a much-needed break over in Australia - Queensland to be precise, my first time there. The weather was typically Queensland, hot and humid, sunny then thunderstorms.
While the thunderstorms were severe, killing one person in Brisbane after severe gales blew a tree over a car out
of the blue one afternoon, it was the damage left over from the flooding earlier this year that was most noticeable.
Brisbane is back to normal; the city looks clean, the river has left almost no clues to its near-record height at the start of this year. The only hint we saw of a flood was some debris still stuck up a tree in the CBD.
But, once you go inland, it's a different story. We drove to the picturesque village of Montville, but the direct route was cut off by a dramatic landslide. A rather long detour around it showed flood damage from earlier in the year. Many roads are damaged and Queensland is a huge state - road workers were everywhere.
So the cyclone season forecast released by the Australian forecaster BOM (Bureau of Meteorology) this week won't be something locals will be happy about. They are predicting more cyclones than average this summer for Queensland.
