Communities living with hazards Editors David King and Alison Cottrell Centre for Disaster Studies James Cook University Published in 2007 by the Centre for Disaster Studies, James Cook University, Townsville and Cairns, Queensland, Australia. Copyright © Centre for Disaster Studies, James Cook University. All rights reserved. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part of this publication may be reproduced by any process whatsoever with out the written permission of the editors and the publisher. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data Communities living with hazards Editors David King and Alison Cottrell Bibliography. Includes index ISBN 0 86443 752 8 Emergency management – Queensland Hazardous geographic environments – Queensland Natural disasters – Queensland Printed in Australia by LogicMedia at James Cook University Cover design by Verve Design, Blackwood Street Townsville Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that the book may contain images and stories of deceased persons. Acknowledgements Adella Edwards: cartography and graphics Jordahna Haig and David Lowe: editorial and coordination Tropical Cyclone Coastal Impacts Program Cairns City Council Terry Hart and Linda Anderson-Berry, Australian Bureau of Meteorology and the Australian Research Council The Indigenous communities and residents of: Wujal Wujal, Mornington Island, Torres Strait islands of Thursday and Horn Islands, Injinoo, New Mapoon, Umagico, Seisia, Bamaga, Palm Island, Ringer Soak, Mulan, Balgo Hills, Billiluna, Halls Creek, Oombulgurri, Kalumburu, Old Mapoon, Yarrabah, Normanton, Lake Nash, Pormpuraaw and Kowanyama Queensland Fire and Rescue Service Queensland Department of Emergency Services Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre Australian Fire Authorities Council Bali Organisations: Parum Samigita, Bali SOS, Bali Recovery Group Informants in Bali Kowanyama Land and Natural Resource Management Office Tamborine Mountain Fire Brigades Thuringowa Fire Brigades Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service Beaudesert/Gold Coast/Thuringowa Councils Tamborine Mountain communities Thuringowa communities School of Indigenous Australian Studies, James Cook University The Center for Disaster Studies is sponsored by the Queensland Department of Emergency Services Disclaimer The State of Queensland, acting through the Department of Emergency Services makes no representations about the suitability of the information contained in this publication for any purpose. In no event shall the State of Queensland be liable for any special, indirect or consequential damages or any damages whatsoever arising out of or in connection with the use of information available in this publication. The views included in this document may not necessarily reflect the views held by the State of Queensland. ii Contents Chapter Title Author Page Acknowledgements ii List of Tables iv List of Figures iv-vi Introduction Communities living with hazards David King and 1 Alison Cottrell 1 What is this thing called ‘community’?: An example in far Alison Cottrell 6 north Queensland 2 Government, non-government and community organisations in David King 18 disasters 3 Enhancing resilience and reducing vulnerability: Lessons learned from David King 33 past disasters 4 Transport and evacuation planning Douglas Goudie 48 5 Tourism, disasters and Scott K. Cunliffe 63 vulnerability 6 Tourism crisis: Management and recovery in tourist-reliant Yetta Gurtner 82 destinations 7 Oral histories about weather Douglas Goudie 102 hazards in northern Australia 8 Lardil weather stories and experiences from Mornington Eddie McLachlan 126 Island 9 Fire risk in Aboriginal peri-urban landscapes in northern Australia: Jim Monaghan 156 Case studies from western Cape York Peninsula 10 Bushfires at the urban-rural Luke J. interface Balcombe 193 11 Living with bushfires: What do Sally Bushnell people expect? and Alison 215 Cottrell References 254 Contributors 282 Glossary 285 Index 286 iii Tables and Figures Table 1.1 A classification of selected definitions of community Table 2.1 Organisations involved in Emergency Management Table 3.1 Post Disaster Studies Carried out by the Centre for Disaster Studies, 1997-2006 Table 3.2 Hazard Awareness Targets Table 4.1 Evacuation matrix of safety responses Table 5.1 Hazards to tourism in tropical coastal areas Table 5.2 Community costs of catastrophic events Table 6.1 Direct foreign tourist arrivals in Bali 2001-2005 Table 9.1 Bushfire risk treatment options in Pormpuraaw Table 9.2 Fire management in Kowanyama Figure 1.1 The Bloomfield River region, Queensland, Australia Figure 2.1 The Integrated Emergency Management System Figure 2.2 Mitigation, Response and Recovery in Space and Time Figure 2.3 Organisation and Membership of Organisations Figure 2.4 A Matrix of Types of Organisations Figure 3.1 Cyclone Tessi damaged Townsville’s Strand in 2000, just after reconstruction had been completed following severe damage caused in 1998 floods Figure 3.2 Damage to Black River settlement in Thuringowa following floods in 1998 Figure 3.3 Storm surge damage at Tikopia Solomon Islands, and tsunami damage at Phuket Thailand Figure 4.1 Lessons learned by Cloncurry flood victims Figure 4.2 Cloncurry resident showing height of flood waters through a ruined storage shed Figure 4.3 Force of the Townsville flood, 1998 Figure 4.4 Main flood points in the Cairns road network Figure 4.5 Cairns building near foreshore during spring tide Figure 4.6 Detail of land-based flooding in the Cairns northern beach roads Figure 4.7 Detail of temporary coast lines and ‘dry’ inner Cairns exit routes Figure 4.8 Kewarra Beach at 1, 2 and 5m (above HAT) surge Figure 5.1 ‘Great’ natural disasters 1950-1999 Figure 5.2 Economic and insured losses for ‘great’ natural catastrophes Figure 5.3 Community assets and vulnerability iv Figure 5.4 The contribution of the Travel and Tourism sector to GDP in APEC countries Figure 5.5 Disaster losses in Asian LDCs Figure 5.6 Disaster losses, total and as share of GDP Figure 6.1 The Crisis Management Continuum Figure 6.2 Location of the terrorist attacks in Kuta, Bali, 12 October 2002 Figure 6.3 Aerial view of the damage caused by the explosions at Paddy’s Bar and the Sari Club Figure 6.4 Tourism crisis – a deserted hotel pool-side in Kuta, January 2003 Figure 7.1 Cloud in the Kimberley Figure 7.2 Two dingoes - the story of the great flood of the Sturt Creek Figure 7.3 Sturt Creek Figure 7.4 Main settlement, Palm Island Figure 7.5 The Kimberley region of north-west Australia Figure 7.6 Forrest River landscape at Oombulgurri in the Kimberley Figure 7.7 Boab trees in Oombulgurri in the Kimberley Figure 8.1 Lardil clan boundaries Figure 8.2 The old mission house, now guest house, Mornington Island Figure 8.2 The wharf and channel at Gununa, Mornington Island Figure 9.1 Western Cape York Peninsula Figure 9.2 Magkara Lagoon is a popular dry season fishing place in the Kowanyama hinterland Figure 9.3 Open fire cooking Figure 9.4 Tending to a kup murri pit Figure 9.5 A dry season camp site Figure 9.6 Carrying water and supplies to a dry season camp site Figure 9.7 An outstation in Kokoberra country Figure 9.8 An outstation in Kokoberra/Yir Thangedl country Figure 9.9 An outstation in Yir Thangedl country Figure 9.10 An outstation in Yir Thangedl/ Yir Yoront country Figure 9.11 An outstation in Kuuk Thaayore country Figure 9.12 Early Dry Season Fire Frequency 1999 – 2002 Figure 9.13 Late dry season fire frequency: 1999 – 2002 Figure9.14 Entire dry season fire frequency: 1999 – 2002 Figure 9.15 Outstation sites and fire frequency in 2001 in the Pormpuraaw DOGIT and Strathgordon pastoral property Figure 9.16 Fire scars in the vicinity of the Pormpuraaw township v Figure 10.1 Interface condition – Tamborine Mountain, Queensland Figure 10.2 Intermix condition – Tamborine Mountain, Queensland Figure 10.3 Occluded condition Figure 10.4 Rural condition – Tamborine Mountain, Queensland Figure 10.5 Type 1 i-Zone Figure 10.6 Type 2 i-Zone Figure 10.7 Mount Tamborine Figure 10.8 Northern Gold Coast Figure 10.9 Canberra bushfires, January 2003 Figure 10.10 Canberra bushfires, January 2003 Figure 10.11 Canberra bushfires, January 2003 Figure 11.1 Rural Fire Brigade member and cohesiveness vi Introduction Communities living with hazards David King and Alison Cottrell This book, Communities Living with Hazards, is a celebration of the twenty- fifth anniversary of the establishment of the Centre for Disaster Studies. The Centre was formally established by resolution of the Council of James Cook University on 5 April 1979. Staff and researchers with the Centre in 2004 contributed papers that encapsulated their areas of disaster research in order to present a summary of the diversity and orientation of the Centre after 25 years. Disaster and hazard research at James Cook University was given impetus following the devastation of Townsville in 1971 by Cyclone Althea. A group of geographers and engineers, led by John Oliver and Hugh Trollope built up expertise in cyclones that enabled them to contribute significantly to the analysis of Cyclone Tracy’s destruction of Darwin in 1974. The engineers established the Cyclone Testing Station in 1977, while Oliver continued research on the physical and social impacts of cyclones and other natural hazards. This research was given focus by the establishment of the Centre in order to improve understanding of both hazards and their impact on people and communities. The social impact was given stronger emphasis by the developing needs of emergency managers and subsequently the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction throughout the 1990s. By 2005 the emphasis of research in the Centre had become primarily social and community in orientation, but was not restricted to natural hazards. Just as emergency managers have been forced to pay greater attention to human induced catastrophes, so also have researchers in the Centre become involved in the impact of terrorism and complex human disasters.