Days of pounding rain last week left much of northeastern Australia swamped by muddy water, with flooding affecting about 200,000 people in an area larger than France and Germany combined. The rain has stopped, but rivers are still rising and overflowing into low-lying communities as the water moves toward the ocean.
Australia Floods Biblical Proportions
On Saturday night, two cars trying to cross a flooded causeway were swept into a river in Burketown, in western Queensland State, the police said. A 41-year-old woman traveling in the second car disappeared, and her body was recovered Sunday about 1.2 miles away, Queensland police officers said.
About 1,000 people were living in evacuation centers across the state, and it may be a month before floodwaters recede, said Alistair Dawson, the acting assistant police commissioner in Queensland.
“It’s hard to make the call that the worst is behind us,” he said. “I think we’re in the middle of the event.”
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/03/world/asia/03australia.html?src=twrhp
Australia Floods Biblical Proportions
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