1893 flood

In late January 1893, three flood events unfolded over a fortnight. The river peaked at 8.35 metres in the city and 17 days later at 8.09 metres. In Kurilpa, 198 buildings were destroyed. It washed 30 houses away from Orleigh Estate, now Orleigh Park, where a 15-year-old boy lost his life. The ‘Great Flood of Brisbane’ caused £2,000,000 worth of damages. It swept away the Victoria Bridge and the Indooroopilly Railway Bridge and covered South Brisbane streets in 8-inches of mud. This flood shifted the colonies’ view of the river as an economic resource to a threat.

Margaret Cook (2019) A River with a City Problem: A History of Brisbane Floods pxiii 

State Library of Queensland “1893 Brisbane flood” November 18, 2011

Image: Victoria Bridge, Brisbane, washed away during the Great Flood c1893. Courtesy: John Oxley Library, State Library Queensland.