Brisbane Next?

People are being urged to abandon their homes and flee the surging water as Brisbane becomes the latest victims Queenslands floods.

Floods 2011

Nearly 9000 homes and businesses are at risk of this new flood threat and this is not even expected to peak until Wednesday or Thursday this week.

The streets are very quiet with many families having moved to refuge centres with at least 200,000 people having been affected.

When all the danger is past the Queenslanders will then have to face the clean up and try to restore what is estimated at billions of dollars of damage.

What is happening in Brisbane is a result of the floods in the rest of Queensland.  Brisbane is facing a combined surge of water from the flooded Lockyer Valley and the Wivenhoe Dam, which is so full it has been forced into controlled releases.

Floods 1974

Authorities fear the Brisbane River will go beyond the 5.45m (17.9ft) peak that was reached during the devastating floods of 1974.

Sandbags have been given out in a city that houses almost 2 million people.  Many have already fled to the refuge centres and cars are constantly leaving the city.

Mayor Campbell Newman said: "Today is very significant, tomorrow is bad, and Thursday is going to be devastating for the residents and businesses affected."

To add to the mayhem - power has been cut affecting 100,000 homes and businesses.  This is a safety measure and the substations will be checked on Wednesday (today in Brisbane) afternoon after the high tide.

The natural crisis that follows this one is the supermarkets and shops running out of food.  Panic buying will have lead to the supermarkets shelves being depleted and now the shops themselves are closing in the face of this latest disaster.  

Food prices are set to rise as much as 30% in the next few months as a result of the Queensland floods and this will also push up headline inflation according to a JP Morgan.

JP Morgan also said that coal mining had been significantly damaged and estimated that the floods would shave 0.4% off GDP growth in the last quarter of 2010 and the first three months of 2011.