Clean-up begins after cyclone Larry

A MASSIVE clean-up operation was underway yesterday after super cyclone Larry ripped through northern Queensland leaving behind a devastated landscape.

Powerful winds up to 180mph plucked roofs from houses, uprooted trees and smashed through entire banana and sugar cane plantations causing tens of millions of dollars worth of damage. Incredibly, police reported no serious injuries or fatalities.

Tropical cyclone Larry hit land near Innisfail in the far north of Queensland as a top category five, but has since been downgraded to a category four, the Queensland weather bureau said.

It is the strongest cyclone to strike Australia in more than 30 years and was seen as potentially more dangerous than cyclone Tracy, which devastated the northern city of Darwin in 1974, killing 71 people and leaving 20,000 homeless.

But as military helicopters flew over the devastated region to assess the damage, emergency services warned that rising floodwaters teeming with poisonous snakes and crocodiles could pack a more deadly punch than the cyclone.

"Most fatalities can happen after a cyclone passes over," Hailey Gillespie of Queensland's Counter Disaster and Rescue Service said.

"In floodwaters in those areas you could have wildlife, snakes and possibly crocodiles.

"We have the deadliest snakes in the world up here Taipans, King Browns. It would be fair to say they would be very agitated."

Innisfail police said they had been inundated with calls from terrified residents whose "homes are literally crumbling around them".

"We have roofs flying off in Fly Fish Point, Silkwood and in the city centre," an Innisfail police spokeswoman said. "And we have trees across roads."

"We've had reports of some casualties at Cairns hospital, some 20 or so," weather bureau forecaster Jonty Hall said. "There's also some reports of a few people missing as well."