Body found in search for missing man amid floods – live updates

A body has been found during the search for a 61-year-old man who was swept away in floodwaters near Dorrigo, northern NSW.

The man was lost after his ute was washed off a bridge into fast-moving water on Friday afternoon. He managed to climb into a tree about 30 metres from the riverbank, but emergency services were unable to reach him before he was carried away by the current.

NSW Police confirmed that a body was discovered nearby at 4.30pm on Saturday. While formal identification is yet to take place, authorities believe it is the missing man. A report will be prepared for the coroner.

Alfred spent more than 10 days in the Coral Sea, fluctuating in intensity as it struggled to maintain strength. According to Associate professor Iftekhar Ahmed, tropical cyclones feed off warm ocean temperatures, but as they move toward shallower waters, they weaken. “The cloud cover generated by the cyclone can also reduce heat gain in the water, limiting further intensification,” he said.

However, even a weakened system can bring destruction. “The wind power has reduced, and Brisbane and southeast Queensland have escaped the worst-case scenario, but Alfred is still dumping heavy rain. Flooding is the main impact to watch out for,” Dr Ahmed added.

Acting Gold Coast mayor Donna Gates says the city has fared better than expected after a tense night of damaging winds and heavy rainfall from Cyclone Alfred.

“We had winds of upwards of 100kmph last night,” she said in an update to reporters a while ago, adding that gale-force winds could still persist throughout the day.

More than 134,000 homes remain without power, with the city’s main priority now being to restore electricity to hospitals. Gates said Gold Coast University Hospital and John Flynn Private Hospital were the focus of restoration efforts, with John Flynn’s reactivation also being crucial for reopening the airport.

“I understand there’s a fair bit of work to do at the airport,” she said. “They are not ready to accept passengers.”

Meanwhile, major river flooding has been recorded at Currumbin and Tallebudgera Creek. Three evacuation centres remain open, with 122 evacuees seeking refuge overnight. However, two centres lost power, and authorities are working to restore electricity.

To support residents still without power, the council plans to open community centres and libraries as safe hubs where people can charge devices, access medical equipment, and get a hot drink. Ms Gates said updates on which locations would be available will be posted on the City of Gold Coast’s disaster dashboard.

Gold Coast is scaling back warnings, the city’s disaster coordinator, Mark Ryan, says.

The warnings levels will be reduced to Yellow level, which means residents can use their own judgement and act with caution.

Earlier, Gold Coast acting mayor Donna Gates asked people to be careful when deciding to step outside.

“Use your common sense but still stay away from that damaged infrastructure and the beaches but monitor the conditions,” she said.

“If you need to be on the roads, drive to the conditions but bearing in mind … you are better off the road today if at all possible.”

Qantas says it is working to restart domestic and international flights at Brisbane, Gold Coast and Maroochydore from 6am tomorrow.

In a statement, the airline said this was “subject to weather conditions and safety assessments.”

We are expecting to progressively rebuild our schedule throughout the day.

Our teams are working to help customers travel in and out of southeast Queensland and northern NSW as safely and as quickly as possible and continue to work closely with the state and federal government and the relevant local airport authorities.

The Sunshine Coast mayor said her community was “breathing a sigh of relief” as they fared better than they had feared.

“On the Sunshine Coast, we are really breathing a sigh of relief because we are not seeing right now the same impact as our neighbours to the south,” Rosanna Natoli told ABC News. Ms Natoli, however, added that they were still prepared for potential flash flooding.

Speaking to Sky News, she said: “We’ve been waiting and for a few days there it looked like we might actually be where the cyclone crossed, and we might bear the absolute worst, and that hasn’t happened.”

She said some areas haven’t seen any rainfall but the community is “not out of the woods yet”.

“It’s almost as if we’re still waiting for our turn with Alfred.”

“It is a strange place to be in between the storm that was [and] what we’ve seen happening down south, [but] it’s no time to be complacent.”

NSW police says they have been unable to find the missing man who was lost in floodwaters near Dorrigo.

“Police have responded to the scene where the male had been washed downstream, there was a short period of time where they were able to engage with him, however his position inside the flooded river prevented any emergency services from getting close to him. And unfortunately he has been washed downstream.”

The 61-year-old was a local from the Megan township, the police said, and believed to be passing from one area to another.

“His vehicle has entered a flooded bridge and was washed off. This highlights the public messaging; do not enter flooded roads, bridges or causeways.”

NSW premier Chris Minns warned ‘this emergency is not over’ even as Alfred is downgraded.

“The rivers are full, the rain is continuing and expected to keep falling in the days ahead, and wind conditions are very high and extreme, particularly on the coast, particularly in the Byron Shire right up to the Queensland border,” the premier said this morning.

“It is crucially important that the public not dismiss this weather event as something that has already passed.”

It really doesn’t matter to us whether it has been downgraded from the tropical cyclone to a weather event, or whether it is still a tropical cyclone.

The effect on the northern rivers communities and lower down into the Coffs Harbour area is still the same for thousands and thousands of families.

The next 24 hours will be crucially important as we look to see what the weather event will do to these communities.”

Ex-tropical cyclone Alfred has been lingering off the coast of Queensland for hours as a very slow-moving system.

The storm lies off Bribie Island and is moving slowly north, the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) said.

It is expected to cross the mainland coast between Maroochydore and Bribie Island this morning.

The storm was downgraded to a Tropical Low, which means it doesn’t have cyclone strength anymore but it is still continuing to lash a large region with rainfall.

The tropical low has sustained winds near the centre of 55 kilometres per hour with wind gusts to 85kmph.

It was located within 65km north northeast of Brisbane and 40km south southeast of Maroochydore.

BoM said heavy rainfall is expected to continue over southeast Queensland and northeast New South Wales during the weekend.