Everyone knows that the hurricane hit Darwin, but what else did it go? Well it started of in the Arafura Sea, about 370km north-east of Darwin. The United States found the first traces of Tracy with there ESSA-8 satellite. At that time it was just a large cloud. It was monitored for a while and them an alert was made. Since the cyclone was small and wasn't heading towards Darwin there was no need for panache.
The small islands above Darwin were damaged on the 23rd of September during the morning but there weren't a lot of people living there and because the cyclone was only small and undeveloped the damage was little.
The storm then continued down the coast of Bathurst Island. When the coast ended the tropical cyclone made a 90° turn toward Darwin. It was now the 24th of December. Early that morning an alert was let out and Darwin officials began passing the word and planning evacuation.
The final approach began on Christmas Eve. Evacuation began to stop and the city was nearly at its goal of 10500 people. The people that were in the city started to find somewhere they could be protected from the storm. Some of the children were evacuated before there parents with there school, some of those parents didn't know were there children were. Around 20 people are already dead.
Early Christmas morning the category 5 tropical cyclone made landfall with wind speeds over 220km/h. everyone leaving was now out and 10638 people were left in the city, 138 more then there target. Now no one was allowed in the city without special permission. Nearby towns were finishing there evacuation and following the same procedure as Darwin did.
The cyclone then slowly collapsed after traveling over Darwin. Members of the city were still not allowed back in to try and stop a big rush of people returning. A lot of information about the cyclone was kept conferential. Rescue teams, soldiers, police and reconstruction people were let in.
The city then slowly opened it self back up to the public and word began to pass about what happened to the rest of the country. Since communication wasn't as good as it is today a lot of the country still didn't know that there was even a cyclone near Darwin.
Over $800000 worth of property was damaged and 65 people were declared dead as a direct result of the cyclone. Alice Springs citizens raised over $105000 to help rebuild there neighboring city. Back then that was an amazing achievement.
To rebuild the city Gough Whitlam created Darwin Reconstruction Commission. Its task was to rebuild the city within 5 years. Some people suggested moving the entire city to a new location since the damage was so big but the government didn't like this idea. A lot of the next 9 months was spent making temp accommodation; this included the ocean liner MV Patris.
Then in September 1975 permerment housing started to replace temporarily ones. This time with stricter housing codes and rules.
By 1978 most Darwin was back in full operation but a lot of its old residendants never returned.
This cyclone highlighted a problem in the political system. NT did not have enough governmental responsibilities or powers. After Tracy NT was given extra powers to self-govern.
Up until 2005 government responses to Tracy were kept conferential. When the Australia Freedom of Information act was passed people were given a better understanding to what happened as conferential information was released.
To learn more about Tropical cyclone Tracy visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclone_Tracy or to find out more about tropical cyclones in general visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_cyclone.
