What were the responses to the Queensland floods?

Answer 1

As is to be expected, the Queensland floods have brought a very wide range of responses.

Grief was the first response. People lost family members, pets, property and their very livelihood. Farmers and business owners, in particular, faced heartbreak of losses that they can never recoup. Flood insurance is very expensive for people who live anywhere near the river or in low areas, so many of these people were not insured. There was nothing for them to do but rebuild from scratch. It was especially hard when people saw others swept away, or went to assist in saving people, and saw young children swept away by the floodwaters. There was a great deal of grief.

Above all, though, Australians are remarkable and resilient people. People helped total strangers evacuate homes and offices. At the RSPCA refuge, people came along as they were being evacuated themselves, and took animals to foster. Although they faced losing everything, they were still willing to give more of themselves. Within the areas of devastation, people who were luckier and avoided floods in their own homes helped fill sandbags, helped organise the sorting and packing of donations, volunteered their time at the evacuation centres or opened their homes to people who needed a place to stay. Again and again, stories surfaced about people who had not escaped unscathed, but who still offered their help to people worse off than themselves. There is an Australian ethos of just getting in and helping neighbours, no matter what, and this really shone through in this difficult time. Naturally, the police and emergency services personnel worked tirelessly.

In each community, once the rivers and floodwaters peaked, people immediately started to rally, looking ahead to the need to clean up. There was no complaining - just people getting in and starting to clean up, because they knew it had to be done. And, as always, there were total strangers getting in and helping clean up. Brisbane dubbed Saturday 15 January as "Salvation Saturday". On this day, thousands and thousands of volunteers turned up at registration centres around the city with any cleaning equipment they had, queuing for long periods of time, awaiting their instructions and ready to be bussed to suburbs where help was needed.

After the floods started to go down, various authorities started looking for someone to blame. An inquiry was initiated into whether more water from Wivenhoe Dam should have been released earlier; questions were asked as to why the authorities did not heed warnings from people with local knowledge who believed a flood was inevitable.

Answer 2

The government had responded by rescuing the people more likely at risk from the floods.