Officials defend BoM amid far-north Queensland flood crisis

Officials have mounted a robust defence of the Bureau of Meteorology's forecasting as communities across far north Queensland grapple with devastating floods from ex-tropical cyclone Jasper.

Up to 2000 millimetres of rain has fallen in seven days, stranding residents and forcing large-scale evacuations from towns including Cairns and the Aboriginal community of Wujal Wujal. The scale of the flooding—and delays in some warnings reaching isolated communities—have prompted scrutiny of the Bureau's forecasting decisions.

On Saturday morning, the Bureau released a video update suggesting that rainfall intensity along the coast was easing and downgraded severe weather warnings for coastal areas. But residents in the Cairns suburb of Holloways Beach reported receiving their major flood warning only on Sunday morning, by which point they were already isolated. That gap fuelled criticism about the timing and accuracy of the alert system.

Federal Emergency Management Minister Murray Watt stepped into the debate on Tuesday with an emphatic defence. He told reporters that no organisation anywhere was better equipped to make forecasting judgements than Australia's meteorological agency.

"The Bureau of Meteorology do the absolute best they can with the science they have available," Watt said. "I can't think of another agency in the world that I'd rather be relying on to make decisions."

He stressed that warnings had been issued for days before conditions peaked, framing the challenge as one of unprecedented intensity: rain in "an area of Australia that knows how to deal with storms, cyclones and floods."

Yet Watt, while defending the Bureau, also signalled openness to scrutiny. Warning systems would be examined and refined, he acknowledged, if the analysis revealed lessons to learn.

"Meteorology is not a perfect science," he said. "If there are improvements that we can make around warning systems, then we'll make those."

State Disaster Coordinator Deputy Commissioner Shane Chelepy's immediate focus was the human cost. He called for urgent action to locate an 85-year-old man from Degarra whose home was destroyed and who has been missing since Monday, with police and rescue crews conducting intensive searches.

Queensland Premier Steven Miles, speaking on Wednesday morning, outlined the scale of recovery work ahead. Electricity networks, water and sewerage systems across Wujal Wujal had suffered extensive damage, he said, making it impossible to predict when residents could return.

"Those Chinooks have been a Godsend getting people out of there," Miles said of the Australian Defence Force helicopters sent from Townsville, which extracted residents stranded on rooftops before they reached higher ground on Monday.

Evacuations from Wujal Wujal to Cooktown began on Tuesday, with about half of the community's 300 residents brought to safety and additional flights planned for Wednesday. The federal government opened disaster relief applications on Wednesday afternoon, offering $1000 per adult and $400 per child across nine affected local government areas.