This came from an email circulated a couple of weeks ago. I highlighted the paragraph at the end about the FDS, we can get in trouble if we don't follow their directions--carefully
At this moment, Friday morning, Australian time, all our brothers and sisters are safe and accounted for. Some homes are badly damaged and some Kingdom Halls will need major work but generally the damage is such that they will be able to return to their homes. Keep in mind that we are looking at an area as large as California and most major roads are still cut and many places that had the floods almost a week ago are still cut off. Now the danger has gone to other outback Queensland towns and we have serious flooding in my state of New South Wales as well as Victoria and Tasmania, so it is widespread and the cost will be around $12billion to repair it all. At this moment 16 are confirmed dead and 60 are missing and they are going from door to door and car to car to see if they can find more bodies.
What has helped save our brothers has been that they have had their “evacuation or Go bags” ready and the congregations have had up to date phone numbers for everyone. That has made it easier to keep in touch with them. Also, the food shelves were stripped of essentials so the brothers were protected as they already had their 3 day supplies ready. In some places the water is receding, in other places it will be another week before the roads are re-opened. In many places the trucks can’t get through to deliver and pick up needed supplies and the milk farmers send in to market has had to be poured out. The rubbish and debris is incredible and in many places disease is a problem. However, the local, state and federal governments have been tightly organized and they have responded quickly. We had a letter read out at our meeting on Wednesday night from the Society giving us an update. They suggested if we wanted to help to make donations through our local World Wide contribution boxes.
One big problem has been the snakes looking for safer places and most of these are extremely dangerous. In the north the crocodiles have been in the streets and in a large town just outside of Brisbane a bull shark was sighted swimming down the main street looking for the river! We spent three years on district work in Queensland and we know most of the brothers and the towns and we are amazed to see pictures of areas under water that we never thought would go under. In one mining town called Emerald they used to have a Kingdom Hall near the river, but because of the increase in publishers they bought land in a safer area and were getting ready to build when the circuit and district overseer suggested they build higher just to make sure. They finally agreed and as a result the water just came to the front steps! All travelling overseers in Queensland have been busy keeping touch with the Society and the local brothers as in most cases they themselves are flood bound. One big thing the RBC groups have learned is not to try and fix houses and Kingdom Halls too quickly. They have to make sure that they are totally dry as in the past they have rushed in and repaired, only to find within six months they have had to do it again because walls have not been totally dried out and so the new work has buckled and had to be replaced.
We have cyclones forming off the coast of Western Australia and another one off the top of Queensland which may well hit next week and so many towns will be hit again. Many small towns have already been hit twice. Fresh food will be seriously affected as will the sugar cane, mangoes and pineapples, potatoes, onions so we will all feel the price rise which will be about 30%. Many people refused to heed the authorities and as a result they have suffered. Power is cut off to many towns and this is the largest flood ever seen in Australia. Last week one dam near Brisbane had 65% water, and now it has 190% but the dams are all safe.
The big thing the brothers have learned is to follow carefully the directions of the Faithful Slave. Once we think we know better, that’s when we get into trouble. My wife’s family have a farm at Grafton and they are surrounded by water. There are two congregations in Grafton and her two brothers run the farm and one is an elder so they have reported that all the brothers are safe. I think that’s about the latest. I will give you a further update as we learn more. The humidity here in Sydney at the moment is shocking and yesterday we struggled in the ministry as the humidity was close to 90%.
