Soggy Australia Takes Yet Another Foot of Rain

La Niña just won't let up
By Polly Davis Doig,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 8, 2011 8:17 AM CST
Soggy Australia Takes Yet Another Foot of Rain
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard flies in an Army helicopter with Col. Luke Foster to view the flooded Fitzroy River in northeast Queensland state, Australia, Saturday, Jan. 8, 2011.   (Murray Ware)

When it rains, it pours and keeps on pouring in Australia these days: Already drenched from weeks of torrential rains, Queensland took another foot of rain over the course of a few hours today. A river flooded its banks in the downpour, and swept a town, where only some 20 buildings were expected to be flooded. Water levels are expected to peak tomorrow, reports the AP.

The country's worst flooding in half a century is being blamed on La Niña, but the new rain underscores just how little more Australia can absorb. "Until we see these floodwaters recede, we won't see the true extent of the damage," says PM Julia Gillard, who today was touring towns affected.
(More Australia stories.)

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