It was around 10 o’clock in the evening on Monday when I sat down to watch a replay of the evening news on ABC. By that time, I’d already finished Monday’s post, a cutesy cuddly article called Look Who Joined Us for Dinner.
That’s when I discovered for the first time that I had been in an earthquake. Not the epicentre, of course not, that was 200 kilometres away north of Brisbane, just outside of a town called Eidsvold. Let’s see what they said about it on 7 News…
Update July 2015: Unfortunately the video I had for you has now been removed. My apologies.
It happened at 2 o’clock in the morning and according to Geoscience Australia the after-shocks were felt “North to Rockhampton, south to Brisbane and south west to Toowoomba.”
I was still up, and up for some time afterwards, and I’m in Brisbane, I didn’t feel a thing. But the next day, I notice something quite extraordinary had happened to two pictures hanging on on our wall…
I’m sure they were perfectly straight when I went to bed.
I shouldn’t make light of it though, earthquakes are serious business and Geoscience Australia say this quake could have been devastating. It wasn’t, because it actually happened 25 kilometres away from the town of Eidsvold and basically not much is there.
If it had happened in a more populated area, it could have been a tragedy. In 1989 a 5.6 magnitude earthquake killed 13 people in Newcastle, New South Wales, our highest death toll from a quake ever.
You can read more about earthquakes in my post called Australia and Earthquakes. Surely Not…..
Queensland eh? Whatever next?
Cyclones heading for Queensland
Yes, that’s what’s next. Two of them by the looks of it.
Queensland is used to cyclones, especially Far North Queensland, where Tropical Cyclone Lam has formed about 140 kilometres from the coast. Local residents are already battening down the hatches.
The second was not technically a cyclone this morning, it’s was a tropical low. By this evening though, it had intensified to form TC Marcia. This morning they were thinking it could reach Brisbane, this afternoon, after it made a bit of a sharp left turn, they now think it will probably hit between St Lawrence, south of Mackay, and Hervey Bay early on Friday.
Source: BOM
But for sure, unlike the earthquake, Brisbane will feel the force of this one. Whatever happens, we are going to have a very wet few days ahead of us with something like 200 mm to 500 mm of rain expected between now and Saturday. The cyclone may not quite reach Brisbane, but I’m sure it will be very windy all the same.
Other than that, not much else going on in Queensland.
Hi Bob,
It works in Belgium. Thank you.
Brilliant, thanks for letting me know.
A small update: when I ‘fixed it’ so that the video would play in all countries, I also ‘broke it’ and it no longer played on portable devices like Android or iPad because they don’t like flash.
So now I have two options and I’ve amended the above post to include them both.
The video doesn’t work in Belgium either.
This appears to have been a new thing by 7 News, blocking some countries, but I think I may have found a way round it. Try watching the video again, it should work in Belgium as well as the UK now, let me know if it works if you get the chance.
Video doesn’t work here in the UK unfortunately.
I’d just like to say thanks Bob for this amazing blog! I’ve had a dream of living in Australia for about a year now and, since I’m only 15, I’ve been so motivated to work hard in my studies so that I can move to Oz as soon as possible! Keep up the good work!
Gosh, I never knew. I’ve just looked into it, it appears that 7 News do not allow their videos to play in the UK and who knows where else. I’ll have to stop using thems from now on. Sorry about that.
You didn’t miss much, it was only a 39 second video where they interviewed a couple of locals who heard a bit of rumbling, the guy at the end says, well, it’s in the quote above.
Seems most people slept through it.
Anyway, you’re planning ahead, good for you. If you work hard, study, maybe even get a degree and a good skill behind you, you can make your dream come true. Selecting that skill is a tricky one though, whatever is on the skills lists now for Australia may well not be there by the time you qualify, just thought I’d warn you.
Good luck, Bob