I still call Australia home and Refuge, Natural disasters in Australia, Cyclones

Cyclones: Australia experiences a range of 'natural disasters' including bushfires, floods, severe storms, earthquakes and landslides. These events cause great financial hardship for individuals and communities, and can result in loss of life, which has become part of Australian folklore.

However, these events are also considered both part of the natural cycle of weather patterns in Australia as well as being affected by human factors such as overstocking, vegetation loss, dams, groundwater and irrigation schemes. These patterns are recognised by terms such as a 100-year drought - a drought of severity that is only seen once in a hundred years. Fire can often follow drought, and drought can be followed by flood. Severe fires followed by drought can also contribute to soil erosion.

The experience of natural disaster has come to be seen as part of the Australian national character as described in the poem 'My Country' by Dorothea McKellar (1904).

I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons, I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror - the wide brown land for me!

Cyclones

A cyclone is an area of low pressure around which the winds flow clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere and counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere. If the sustained winds around the centre reach 119 km/h (with wind gusts in excess of 170 km/h), then the system is called a severe tropical cyclone. In other countries severe tropical cyclones are called hurricanes or typhoons. The Tropical Cyclone Season in Australia extends from November to April. Some of the most destructive cyclones which have hit the Australian mainland include:

Cyclone Mahina, 1899

In March 1899 in Cape York, Queensland, Cyclone Mahina resulted in the greatest death toll of any natural disaster in Australia's recorded history. Over 400 people died, including the crews of around 100 pearling fleet vessels, and an estimated 100 local Aborigines.

Cyclone Ada, 1970

Tropical Cyclone Ada caused severe damage to resorts on the Whitsunday Islands, Queensland, in January 1970. Its path of destruction included the islands of Daydream, South Molle and Hayman. The damage bill was estimated at $A390 million and 14 people were killed.

The devastation inflicted on Darwin by Cyclone Tracy in December 1974. Photo by Australian Information Services. Image courtesy of the Bureau of Meteorology.

Cyclone Tracy, 1974

On Christmas Eve 1974, Cyclone Tracy struck the city of Darwin in the Northern Territory. One hundred and ninety-five millimetres of rain fell in less than nine hours, and winds of around 250 km per hour flattened the city. In terms of damage to a community, Cyclone Tracy remains Australia's most destructive for property damage. 71 people were killed, and many thousands injured. Of a population of 43,000, 25,000 were left homeless. One result was the priority given to the development of cyclone-proof buildings.

Cyclone Larry, 2006

The Far North Queensland coast was declared a natural disaster zone after the severe impact of tropical Cyclone Larry on 20 March 2006. The category five cyclone registered winds of up to 290 km/h. Major damage was caused to homes, other buildings and agricultural crops, but no loss of life occurred. $A1.5 billion was the estimated total damage bill for the affected regions.