Residents who prepared for the cyclone now have little to do but wait and see how their efforts will pay off against the rising water.

Residents are stacking sandbags to protect low-lying properties ahead of a tropical cyclone that is forecast to become the first in 51 years to hit the Australian east coast near Brisbane, the nation’s third-most populous city.

Significant damage and power outages are possible in the densely populated region of Queensland, where tropical cyclones impacts are not uncommon but direct landfalls are.