Unbelievable, unimaginable despair and disaster all over the world. Developing and third world countries lose so much when disasters happen and I couldn't help thinking that even though it's a tragedy in QLD, if they weren't prepared, it could have been worse. I've often thought that if we were ever unfortunate enough to be caught in a natural disaster, or any accident really, I'd want to be in Australia.
In Australia, we have resources. Those wonderful people from the SES, communications that get the word around, communities that pull together, buildings that have half a chance of not collapsing and skilled people looking after the dams and releasing the right amount of water at the right time. The people in Brisbane knew the floods were coming and Anna Bligh prepared them for the worst. I'm sure many lives were saved because of this. Their Premier is leading with strength and compassion. She comes across well on the international news. If you didn't know any better, you'd mistake her for the leader of the country. That's how strong she looks. Her words make sense. She knows the finer details of the disaster - water levels, towns, what people have lost, which businesses are affected, who needs to prepare and how, what those left behind need to do. I think she's doing a great job and those Queenslanders, even though they have lost much, have a whole lot to be thankful for as well. It could have been much, much worse.
2 comments:
Sorry Jo I have not read this post until Sunday (today).
It is amazing the flooding.
It was October when the father in law (ex QLD) and I were talking about the dam levels.
One thing that came up in OCTOBER 2010 was the comment "if they do not start releasing water from the grid three dams (the three largest) they will be in trouble when the rains come".
They did not want to do this because they had just spent 1.1 Billion on what would suddenly become a redundant desalination plant. Bad politics you see.
Back in October the discussion was (I can almost quote it) was "do they risk drowning people by not releasing water now or do they admit the desalination plant instead of bigger dams was the wrong call and let water go now"?
The real test of Anna Bligh will be when the water recedes and the anger with their poor water management floats to the surface.
The damage caused so far is approximately 10 huge hydro dams each the size of Vic. Thompson dam.
The comparison though between Bligh and Gillard is amazing here.
Bligh is currently getting the pats and Gillard the kicks.
I will be very interested to see if the floods will be the saviour of the State Labor Gov. in QLD or the final straw.
It's never as simple as it seems, is it. Uggh, politics.
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