Official Luthiers Forum!

Remember in that movie "Pointbreak" where they talk about the 50 year storm at Bells Beach Australia, being the biggest surf in the world?

We've just had it again, a bit north of Bells though. Widespread damage, 9 people killed, 105 000 homes without power. Flooding is continuing with inland towns being evacuated. We needed the rain with dang levels at record lows and water restrictions in place due to the drought, but not all at once. Funny thing is this won't break the current drought that's the worst on record.

These pics are of a brand new bulk coal carrier that's been washed ashore by 50 knot winds and 60' waves. They aren't sure if they'll ever get it off the beach. Nobody was injured luckily. There is more than 700 tonnes of fuel and oil aboard, so the hope is that she won't break up.





A family of 5 was killed when this section of road gave way. My neighbour was on the same road only minutes behind when it happened.

Hi Paul,
           Yes, the ship parked on Nobby's Beach seems quite unreal. At over two hundred meters long,some experts reckon it's not going to be moveable.

I was concerned how you were going . Particularly with your unfinished building extention. Everything O.K.?

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CRAIG LAWRENCE of AUSTRALIA
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Hi Kiwi, Long time no speaky. We need to resume our corespondence - I guess that means I need to pull my finger out.

We're doing ok, lots of water around. The new extension got flooded to the level of the ant capping, so no damage to the floor. The new roof was leaking water right onto our new electrical distribution board (415V and a whole lot of amps there), which we just paid 4 1/2 grand for. So there were a few worried hours while I figured how to divert the flow without having to either climb out onto a 7.5 meter high wet slippery roof in the middle of a huge storm, or get myself electrocuted. Did I mention that I'm scared of heights? Had a fall on a building site once, amazing how much thinking you can do on the way down. Most of it is associated with how much it's gonna hurt when you stop. The water is now being directed into buckets. The roof guy is gonna get his behind here pronto on Tuesday to fix it.

I think they can get that ship out in theory, but it's gonna take a whole lot of money to do it. There's bound to be a lot of sand moving 'round the hull right now which will just dig her deeper, so they'll probably have to dredge around it and dredge a channel. Easy said. Or it'll be a new tourist attraction until it rusts away.

How's things in your neck of the woods?

      Man! That's surreal! They'll get it out! Big hydralic pumps blowing sand out and it will be happily floating away!

    If they can dredge whole islands they can get that one going!

Sorry to hear about that family.

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Billy Dean Thomas
Covina, CA

"Multi famam, conscientiam, pauci verentur."
(Many fear their reputation, few their conscience)

Paul glad to hear you and family are all right. I hope you repairs get done pronto and without a hitch.

That bulk coal carrier today would cost in the order of US$125 to $160 million. If the hull is totally intact that will be a huge incentive to remove it. Lloyds would pay a huge chunk of cash to get it out of there than be faced with the insurance claim.

Luckily the ship was driven over the small reef just off shore and is now entirely supported by sand, making the risk of it breaking up much lower. Two other tankers were in trouble the other night... both had engines going flat out and were still slowly being driven back into the coast by the wind and waves. Luckily both made it out to sea during a break in the weather. Nobby's Beach is one (was one) of the great surfing beaches here in Newcastle.

Funniy enough we've been told to restrict our water usage, not because we don't have enough water, but because the pumps don't have constant power due to the outages. Otherwise, Newcastle is one of the very few places in Australia not on water restrictions. In fact, the water authorities had to open the spillway for a second time this year as the dam was too full. Breaks your heart to see that much water wasted when so many people so deserately need the water. Rain just isn't falling far enough inland.

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If God had wanted us to drink beer, he would have given us stomaches.

Glad to hear all is OK for you and the family Paul. I'm with you on the heights thing to, worked on multi story demo sites when younger and had my fill of the action Jackson life style back then. In fact anything higher than a bar stool makes me uncomfortable these days

Joel, we could use all of that water and more over here in the West. After extended drought through consecutive seasons a lot of our grain farmers could very well go to the wall if they don't get rain here in the next 2 weeks.

Cheers

Kim