Australia Weather News

North Queenslanders have again been smashed by heavy rains with homes damaged and cars destroyed just weeks after the devastating February floods.

Over three hours before 4am Townsville Airport was hit by 147 millimetres of rain, Pallarenda received 146mm, and Louisa Creek had 132mm.

Since 9am Tuesday, Toolakea has had 293mm, Bluewater has recorded 284mm, and Cardwell has now had 258mm after receiving 202mm on Tuesday afternoon.

There are moderate flood warnings for the Herbert and Bohle rivers, a minor flood warning for the Ross River, and flood warnings for the Black River and Bluewater Creek.

Earlier, communities between Cairns and just south of Townsville were on alert due to a severe weather warning.

Flash flooding, swiftwater rescues

Heavy rain has caused more havoc in Townsville after last month's floods.

Roads are closed across the city and cars have been flooded at West End, close to the CBD.

There have been two minor rockfalls in Belgian Gardens and Castle Hill.

Floodwaters inundated the downstairs of Daniel Leoni's home in the Townsville suburb of Mysterton, destroying electrical goods and children's toys.

"It caught us off-guard," he said.

"I knew it was heavy rain but we've had rain before and the water creeps up — but not as bad, not as fast."

Natalie Johnson and her four adult children fear all their cars have been destroyed after rain inundated their street and parts of their house.

Ms Johnson said there was little warning of the flash flooding.

"When the last floods were coming we got plenty of warning. There was sandbagging. [Today] no-one even got time to sandbag," she said.

Swiftwater rescue crews were called out to assist a car caught in waters in Helens Hill near the Bruce Highway last night.

A woman in her 90s was pulled from the vehicle and taken to Ingham hospital in a stable condition, while another woman in her 70s was able to free herself.

Queensland Police said there were nine SES call-outs in the early hours of Wednesday morning related to sand bagging and water inundation.

Rain easing Wednesday afternoon

Senior meteorologist Matthew Bass said a slow-moving trough had caused significant rainfall overnight across the Herbert and Lower Burdekin districts.

"We've had a slow moving trough that was sitting over the Cardwell and Ingham area yesterday [Tuesday] afternoon, during the evening it's moved slowly towards the east along the coast with some decent rainfall around Paluma and Rollingstone," he said.

He said the system was expected to weaken late on Wednesday, which should ease conditions.

"The good news is in terms of the rainfall we are expecting this trough system to weaken out as we get into the latter morning and particularly in the afternoon," he said.

"We should see the wind surge which is really driving the trough system start to weaken out and we should see those rainfall rates ease back across the area."

Bruce Highway reopened

To the north of Ingham the Bruce Highway was cut by floodwaters, preventing access to communities further north, early this morning, but reopened just before 2pm.

Supermarkets in Queensland's far north were only just being replenished after supply shortages brought on by the impact of Tropical Cyclone Alfred.

A Woolworths spokesperson said the supermarket chain was "closely monitoring the situation around Ingham".

Ingham ready

In the centre of the severe weather warning is Ingham, where 180 properties were severely flood-affected in February.

Hinchinbrook Shire Mayor Ramon Jayo said he was confident that this event would not bring the same devastation as last month.

"There is no [expectation], based on the current forecast, for any houses or properties to be inundated at all," Cr Jayo said.

"We don't get any intervention with our houses and properties until we get to major flooding.

"The community is apprehensive, but based on the current forecast it is just a matter of staying vigilant."