Suburbs at risk from Cyclone Alfred - which schools are closed and which suburbs in Brisbane are being evacuated?
Cyclone Alfred is looming off Queensland's coast, threatening to bring heavy rainfall, damaging winds and monster waves.
As of 5am on Wednesday, Alfred was tracking as a category two system about 465km east of Brisbane and 430km off the Gold Coast, the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) confirmed. The cyclone is forecast to cross between Queensland's K'gari (formerly Fraser Island) and the Gold Coast on Thursday or Friday as a category one or two system.
On Wednesday morning, BoM issued an official warning zone stretching 650km from Double Island Point in Queensland to Grafton in northern NSW. The zone includes Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Sunshine Coast, Byron Bay and Ballina, but doesn't include Grafton. In Brisbane alone, 20,000 homes are at risk of flooding, with an additional 6,000 homes at risk on the Gold Coast, local council modelling shows.
The suburbs of Brighton, Windsor, Ashgrove, Morningside, Rocklea, Coopers Plains, Carina, Sandgate, Hemmant, Lota, Tingalpa, Indooroopilly, Albion, Bardon and Wynnum West are most at risk. On the Gold Coast, the suburbs most at risk from are Surfers Paradise, Paradise Point and Elanora.
Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner urged residents in these areas to evacuate. The major factors being prepared for by the authorities are wave swell and erosion, damage by destructive winds, and significant rain which could lead to flooding.
A total of 122 schools in the north of New South Wales will be closed on Wednesday and Thursday, and vulnerable residents will be urged to relocate by Thursday morning, New South Wales Premier Chris Minns said. Schools closed included Casino, Chatsworth Island, Gulmarrad, Gwabegar, Leeville, Evans River and Drake Public schools. Schools are set to resume operation on Monday, March 10. You can find the full list of Queensland closures here.
Brisbane City Council (BCC) said it plans to open evacuation centres, but a refuge centre is being run from the Ekka showgrounds. "The temporary refuge shelter will open at the RNA showgrounds, Bowen Hills from 7am Thursday and will accept residents until 12pm Thursday [before being] locked down," BCC said.
Further north, council is using Noosa Leisure Centre on Wallace Drive "as a place of refuge for residents and visitors who have no other place to go" during the cyclone — local government said it would operate "24/7 until no longer required", and caged or on-leash pets are welcome too. An evacuation centre at Nambour Showground is also operating on the Sunshine Coast.