Tropical Cyclone Alfred hours away

[Jonathan Haycock]

Latest reports suggest Tropical Cyclone Alfred is intensifying and could make landfall as a Category 3. This will put it at wind speeds between 170-224 km/h, which will be devastating for SE Queensland.

Brisbane likely to take a direct hit, with areas to the South including Gold Coast getting the worst of it. Major flooding is guaranteed due to high levels of intense rainfall and landfall coinciding with a high tide in the early hours of Friday morning. Coastal residents advised to evacuate.

Last Cyclone to hit SE Queensland was 50 years ago. Time to get my rare seedlings off their shelves and in the garage. 

Got those affected by this, stay safe.

[Jonathan Haycock]

Unless Tropical Cyclone Alfred blows the garage roof off, my rarest and most vulnerable palms (that could easily be moved) are now safe.

[peachy]

I have them in the bath, the laundry, my work studio and on the ground in the shade house. Hopefully when this is all over I will still have a shadehouse.

Peachy

P.S. My garage is full of parrots and budgies

[realarch]

High anxiety to say the least. Best of luck!

Of all the natural disasters that could impact us here in East Hawaii, hurricanes are by far the most terrifying. We can handle rainfall, tsunamis, lava flows, and earthquakes, but in high winds, these little plantation style houses with their tin roofs don’t stand a chance. Only a matter of when. 

Johnathan, your car looks like it’s in a dealer showroom. 🙂

Peachy, good luck with the shade house.

Tim

[Jonathan Haycock]

1 minute ago, realarch said:

Jonathan, your car looks like it’s in a dealer showroom. 🙂

Tim

I bought that for the missus Tim, back in 2019 when we emigrated. She certainly looks after it. 

[Harry’s Palms]

I hope you all stay safe . That looks like a doozy of a storm. Harry

[happypalms]

Don’t forget it’s going to give us a hard time south as well as far down as Grafton. Try living in the bush with 30 meter plus trees around you. The wind sounds like a freight train in the bush, pretty well much stay inside away from the trees and the branches. And as for putting the rare collection of palms in the garage well I need a two story car park 

[happypalms]

5 hours ago, Jonathan Haycock said:

Unless Tropical Cyclone Alfred blows the garage roof off, my rarest and most vulnerable palms (that could easily be moved) are now safe.

Good to see you got your priorities right the wife’s car undercover. 

[Jonathan Haycock]

13 hours ago, happypalms said:

Good to see you got your priorities right the wife’s car undercover. 

The wife’s car is always parked in the garage when not in use to keep the harsh Aussie sun and freak storms at bay. It’s our only depreciating asset and we intend to run it into the ground whilst looking nice the whole time 😂. 

[Palm Tree Jim]

Stay safe my palm friends!

 

[Jonathan]

22 hours ago, peachy said:

I have them in the bath, the laundry, my work studio and on the ground in the shade house. Hopefully when this is all over I will still have a shadehouse.

Peachy

P.S. My garage is full of parrots and budgies

Hope you stay safe Peachy...but I'm worried about the parrots.

I love parrots, what sort have you got other than budgies?

[peachy]

2 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Hope you stay safe Peachy...but I'm worried about the parrots.

I love parrots, what sort have you got other than budgies?

My garage is brick and part of the house. My Bourke's and Rosa Bourke parrots are in the lounge room along side with the lorikeet. Just the budgies in the garage but there is a double width glass access door so they can see me moving around in the house. It's the tiny double bar finches who live in the garden that I am worried about. I am putting seed and water on the back patio for them.

Peachy

[Tyrone]

All the best over there. I think it’s been downgraded to a tropical low but centred just north of north Stradbroke Island, so at least wind strength has weakened, but the rainfall will be very intense for a good while. Lots of power outages reported. 

[Jonathan Haycock]

1 hour ago, Tyrone said:

All the best over there. I think it’s been downgraded to a tropical low but centred just north of north Stradbroke Island, so at least wind strength has weakened, but the rainfall will be very intense for a good while. Lots of power outages reported. 

Thanks Tyrone. Yes it's been downgraded to a tropical low. The winds were quite intense last night, blowing my staging over and damaging some palms beneath it. Spent all morning in the wind and rain sorting through the carnage of crushed palms and blown over pots. Should have laid it flat when I had the chance (lesson learned for next time). So glad I moved my rare seedlings off that staging and into the garage. House is in one piece though, which is a relief. 

[Tyrone]

It’s amazing how resilient palms are. I’ve had a fair bit of damage when multiple trees fell on my shadehouse. I actually lost very little in the end but at first it looks like major carnage. I even dropped a tree the wrong way onto the centre of my largest Ravenea rivularis and I thought it may have cracked. It didn’t miss a beat and kept putting out new growth, it just had a few bent fronds. Glad you got out of Alfred in one piece. Enjoy the rain. 

[Jonathan Haycock]

9 hours in the torrential rain today sorting palms and putting the staging back. Shored it up with large pots either side to reduce the risk of it falling again. Took some decent gusts without budging an inch. Palms have taken a battering from the storm, but I reckon most will recover.