Correction: Monica's damage

It seems that reporting that (former) cyclone Monica spared Indigenous communities in the north (in yesterday's post) was rather premature...

This mornings's The Age reported that Monica caused some extensive damage in isolated Aboriginal communities in Arnhem Land, including in Maningrida and the smaller community where my friend had lived and taugh for over a year.

The Aboriginal people in these communities have so little in the first place, and have very poor, overcrowded housing and a lack of facilities. The storm damage will make a bad situation worse – unless more effort and resources are put into housing, resources, infrastructure and support for rural and remote Aboriginal communities like the ones involved.

I can't help but wonder if an outcry about the storm damage, an outpouring of support and relief, and the decrying of poor conditions – accompanying front page news reporting of the damage – would occur if it was predominantly white Darwin that had been hit as predicted, or as in the case of Larry's devastation of northern Queensland...