Cyclone Mahina was the deadliest cyclone in recorded Australian history, and also potentially the most intense tropical cyclone ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere. Mahina struck Bathurst Bay, Cape York Peninsula, colonial Queensland, on 4 March 1899, and its winds and enormous storm surge combined to cause the deaths of more than 300 people. with a likely minimum central pressure of . Clement Lindley Wragge, Government Meteorologist for Queensland, pioneered the naming of such storms and gave this storm its name, Mahina.

Storms of such intensity occur extremely rarely. Scientists identified two other Category 4 or 5 super-cyclones that struck Australia, in the first half of the 19th century, from their effects on the Great Barrier Reef and the Gulf of Carpentaria. This same research shows that on average, such super-cyclones occur in the region only once every two or three centuries.

A pearling fleet, based at Thursday Island, Queensland, was anchored in or near the bay before the storm. Within an hour, the storm drove much of the fleet ashore or onto the Great Barrier Reef; other vessels sank at their anchorages. Four schooners and the manned Channel Rock lightship were lost. A further two schooners were wrecked but later re-floated. The fleets lost 54 luggers, and a further 12 were wrecked but re-floated. People later rescued more than 30 survivors of the wrecked vessels from the shore; however, the storm killed more than 400 people, mostly non-European immigrant crew members. A depiction of the schooner Crest of the Wave in the storm was later sketched in a painting.

A large storm surge, reportedly high, swept across Princess Charlotte Bay and then inland about , destroying anything left of the Bathurst Bay pearling fleet and the settlement.

An eyewitness, constable J. M. Kenny, reported that a storm surge swept over their camp at Barrow Point atop a -high ridge and reached inland, the largest storm surge ever recorded. However, reviewing the evidence for this surge, some scientists modeled a surge only to in height, based on the official central pressure. They also surveyed the area, seeking wave-cut escarpments and deposits characteristic of storm events, but found none higher than . Of the surge, they suggested an incorrectly cited ground level or an involvement of freshwater (rain) flooding. A later study considers this conclusion likely premature and questions the barometer reading as unreliable and not representative of the actual lowest pressure. This subsequent study also examined new evidence of exceptionally high storm surge and inundation.

The cyclone continued southwest over Cape York Peninsula, emerging over the Gulf of Carpentaria, before doubling back and dissipating on 10 March.

Casualties

The exact number of casualties is not known, as many deaths were not recorded. Estimates range between 307 and 410. Eleven crew members of the ship Sagitta were killed.

Around 100 Aboriginal Australians were killed but not recorded, as Aboriginal people were not counted as part of the population at the time. They had tried to help shipwrecked men, but the back surge caught them and swept them into the sea. Only eight Aboriginal people were recorded among the casualties, all of whom died on shore.

Aftermath

People found thousands of fish and some sharks and dolphins several kilometres (miles) inland, and the storm embedded rocks into trees and bushes. On Flinders Island (Queensland), people found dolphins on the cliffs; however, this finding does not necessarily indicate a surge of this height; or between . In a further variant, "during the lull in the hurricane, the barometer on the Olive recorded" .

Most sources record the schooner Crest of the Wave observation as . More modern reports of an observation on a vessel in the eye of Mahina are unrealistic (the most intense tropical cyclone, Typhoon Tip, had a central pressure higher).

One author

See also

  • List of disasters in Australia by death toll
  • List of tropical cyclone records
  • 1899 Queensland colonial election, which occurred during the same month
  • 1970 Bhola cyclone – The deadliest tropical cyclone worldwide, on record
  • 1973 Flores cyclone – The deadliest tropical cyclone recorded in the Southern Hemisphere
  • List of Queensland tropical cyclones

References

Further reading

  • How high was the storm surge from Tropical Cyclone Mahina? by Jonathan Nott, James Cook University, & Matthew Hayne, Australian Geological Survey Organisation
  • Video: The 1899 Pearling fleet disaster – an account by Ian Townsend. Created as part of the Queensland Stories project, State Library of Queensland, Australia. (4 minutes; Windows Media Player, RealPlayer)
  • Natural disasters in Australia
  • Australia's worst cyclone disasters – Queensland State Disaster Management Group