The Perfect Storm

Last week a Category 4 Cyclone shredded its way across across the Queensland coast with winds reaching 250 kilometres per hour. Cyclone Debbie then tranformed into a slow moving tropical low that tormented its way south leaving floods and destruction in its wake. 

Over the course of 8 days, RSL Care + RDNS Ltd staff had to evacuate two residential facilities in Townsville, one in Bowen and one in Mackay. Our facility just south of Yeppoon was isolated by floodwater for three days while another 6 sites in south east Queensland, next to normally picturesque waterways, just spent the weekend on flood watch. At the time of writing, staff in Northern NSW are coping with clean-ups after weekend flooding and the Central Queensland city of Rockhampton is facing a nine-metre flood, the worst in 60 years.

Behind all of this, more than 10,000 Home Care visits have been affected, creating an enormous logistics challenge for our mobile home care teams, care schedulers and Call Centre staff.

Though it all, the work of our frontline care staff and our support staff has been nothing short of heroic.

Staff in Bowen endured more than 30 hours bunkered down in a local bowls club while the cyclone tore the surrounding infrastructure to pieces. In other locations, un-rostered staff moved into sites so they could support their colleagues and residents through the crisis.

Events are still unfolding and it's too early for a comprehensive review of the lessons Debbie has taught us, but some points are already clear;

1. Preparation remains essential. John Lancester's seven Ps - "Proper Planning and Preparation Prevents P- Poor Performance" hold true. In Australia, we experience bush fires, floods, and cyclones every year. There is no excuse not to have well established and regularly rehearsed emergency response protocols and responsibilities ready to execute at ANY time.
2. We should expect more frequent and severe natural disasters. In the past, we have generally coped with one emergency event in one location at one time. This cyclone created a 1,500 kilometre series of disaster events over 8 consecutive days. It was in many ways a dreadful perfect storm.
3. People are the key. Our company is a complex social system where more than 6,000 of our people take pride in making a contribution to the health and wellbeing of frail and often vulnerable customers, supporting them at home or in our residential communities. I am so proud of the selfless contribution our staff made under appalling conditions, placing the wellbeing of residents and clients first and often spending days away from their own homes and families as a result. They continue to pitch in to support each other through the ongoing flood threat and the cyclone clean-up effort.

It's a great privilege to serve and support such outstanding teams!