A question to Australian(s) about tropical cyclones.

Jax Humanhater · Jul 8, 2013

How do you guys deal with cyclones. We call them hurricanes in the States. We haven't had a bad one since Katrina.

Do you guys ride out the storm? Do you take shelter? Where do you evacuate?

I ask this question because my brother and I are thinking of moving there or Canada.

Rhys Gardiner · Jul 8, 2013

It's mostly a case of just taking shelter and riding it out to my knowledge. The vast majority of Australian tropical cyclones occur in the north of the country, where the population is more sparse. The majority of the population is in the south, away from the zones where cyclones are known to occur. Here's a map from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology showing cyclone paths from 1989 to 2003:

Evacuations don't happen very often as far as I'm aware. Put simply, because of the sparseness of the north and the lack of real infrastructure, there aren't many places to evacuate to.

I'm not an expert, but from what I've seen, it's a case of
1) Board up your windows and secure anything loose outside
2) Find a safe place in your house to rest
3) Get out your books and board games to keep yourself occupied!

That's what I know, of course. If there are any other Aussies who know more and have other details (or can show me where I'm wrong on this) please comment...

Bram Hengeveld · Jul 9, 2013

Do you Aussies build your houses with wood like in the States? Thats something I have never understood

If you live in Tornado Alley start building a house out of bricks and you don't need a stormshelter I think.

Lol @ Picture Rhys Gardiner

Ketnix · Jul 9, 2013

The north of Australia is like mentioned already not very populated at all, Western Australia has quite a small population for its size compared the eastern states. The whole state has just over 2million people, with Perth the capital having 1.8million of that population.

Houses here are mostly brick construction, but the cyclones that do hit areas of population up the north of WA don't cause huge damage like you would see in Tornado Alley in the US. Big storms don't come often, at worst you'll get trees uprooted, fences flying around, maybe a few houses losing their roofs.

Rhys Gardiner · Jul 9, 2013

Bram Hengeveld said:
Do you Aussies build your houses with wood like in the States? Thats something I have never understood

No way! You'll only find major wooden construction in older houses, and none up north. Like Ketnix said, it's all about the bricks, and most cyclones aren't that devastating. Better for bushfires, too.

Bram Hengeveld said:
If you live in Tornado Alley start building a house out of bricks and you don't need a stormshelter I think.

I don't know about that... the worst tornadoes in the US are powerful enough to tear almost any house apart, brick or whatever. When it comes to tornadoes, storm shelters are always your best bet.

To elaborate on population sparseness, using what Ketnix said as a springboard: I live in Western Australia too, and as he said, there's a total population of 2 million with 1.8m in the capital city alone. Western Australia is roughly the size of Sudan, and laid on its side, it roughly covers the distance from Boston to Denver.

And you can fit the entirety of western/southern Europe inside Australia as a whole, with room to spare:

That should tell you something about population sparseness.