Min and I were busy with all of these things as well. We had the added drama of a 80 year old house and no rooms that were small and well protected. Our nervous energy before the storm fuels and whirlwind of packing and moving, of which that house had never seen the like, either before or since. It was decided that the Dinning room would be our last retreat. It is definitely the safest room as it is completely internal and surrounded on all sides by other rooms.
The lounge room was emptied completely except for my canoe which came in from outside. All clothes and nick-nacks were packed into cupboards and then the cupboards were ratchet strapped down. Emergency clothes, documents and other essential items (such as the computer backup) were packed into a Nally bin each. This was for grabbing on the way out if we needed to run at any stage All pictures were taken off the walls and packed under the bed in the spare room. The outdoor furniture was turned over and ratchet strapped down to the deck. The table and chairs from the dinning room were moved into the spare room and the lounge chairs were moved into the dinning area. the mattress from our bed was also moved into the dinning area as a last ditch protection method. The Idea being that the lounge chairs would be our walls and the mattress our roof if the roof of the house went.
Once everything was racked, packed and stacked there was not much to do but wait, wander around and look for things to put away or strap down. One problem that we had was the Car. There was nowhere to put it so it was decided that it would be left out on the street.
The other thing that could be done was religiously follow the cyclone tracking map and warnings from the BOM. The Map above shows how big the storm was but it also shows the direct hit on Tully. 24hrs before this the tracking map showed a direct hit somewhere just south of Ingham, which needless to say would have been much more devastating for us here in Townsville.
I saved 3 of the tracking maps that the BOM put out on the day before TC Yasi. These maps become really important to you when something like Yasi is heading towards you.
This was the final map I was able to get. it was 6pm the night that Yasi was about to hit and as you can see from the map it was already quite windy. We lost the Power a couple of hours after this 6pm map.
With our house prepared and maps looked at all that was left was to ride out the storm. Min and I decided that the Puppies should come inside in the cement area beside the Kitchen/dinning area where we were. while outside the dogs would be quite stressed but once they came inside they were as calm as anything not worried at all. Their bed food and water were all inside. The water actually presented a problem due to Bear drinking the water all the time and having to pee. Bear had to pee but wouldn't go outside without me, so I would have to run out into the yard squat down and shelter from the wind as best I could then call to Bear to get him to come outside. No the most fun I've had but at least we only experienced the equivalent to a category 2 cyclone.
Other than Bear's little expeditions the night was reasonably uneventful. I was tweeting until the power went out so that people knew how we were. We were expecting the power to go we just didn't know when it would happen. It happened just after 10pm, so we just shut down the mobile phones to conserve power and gave up on reading. After that the noise was more noticeable and the house would occasionally hum with vibrations from the wind. I think that Min's place though is sheltered from the worst of it by Castle Hill. The worst thing about the cyclone was the heat. Stuck in a closed up house with no fans was a problem. The Next night was without power as well and I had to leave the front and back doors open and lay in the breeze way between them to get to sleep. It's the things your not ready for that get you the most I suppose.
The next day was also a bit of a surprise as it was still really windy. Min and I didn't start the clean up till a couple of days after due to the wind. On the note of the clean up I would like to say that Ergon Energy did a great job in restoring power. The Townsville City Council during it's cleanup produced 10 years worth of Mulch in just over a month.About 200 trucks an hour were dumping green waste at Lou Lister park, producing over 120 cubic meters of mulch an hour for 3 weeks. Townsville's streets and back yards started to look bare with an estimated 63,000 trees destroyed or damaged by Cyclone Yasi.
All in all we were lucky and came through relatively unscathed. Our sympathy and best wishes are with the people of Tully and Cardwell who were the hardest hit and are still trying to rebuild.
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