Fritz crossed the far northern Queensland early on 11 just to the south of Cape Melville. "Fallen trees caused water and power outages at the remote communities of Wujal Wujal, Bloomfield and Ayton north of Cairns. Landslides closed the Gillies Highway near Cairns, and a landslide caused major damage to properties at Yorkeys Knob (northern beach suburb of Cairns). Rainfalls in the 24 hours to 9am 11 February reached 204 mm at Weipa and 173 mm at Saddle Mountain (near Cairns). Further south totals on the 12th reached 309 mm at Upper Murray and 292 mm at Paluma. There was flash flooding in the Innisfail/South Johnstone region with falls of 74 mm in one hour. Fritz moved across Cape York Peninsula and reformed in the southeast corner of the Gulf. At Mornington Island trees were uprooted but there was no structural damage. The lowest barometer reading at Mornington Island was 993.3 hPa at 0330 UTC, 12 February. Sweers Island (17.2S/139.6E) estimated 10-minute mean winds of 45 knots in a special report at 2330 UTC, 11 February 2004, when a rainband south of the centre passed over the Island. Fritz, after crossing the mainland coast near Mornington Island maintained a clear satellite signature as it travelled across inland Northern Territory and Western Australia.

The map at the top left displays the impact area (marked by the black line) with the red line illustrating the path of the eye of the cyclone.

Rockhampton Regional Council in partnership with the Queensland a…

Cyclone Fritz track and intensity (BOM)