Recovery efforts are in full swing as wild weather eases in the south-east, after widespread flash flooding between the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast over the past 48 hours.
Queensland emergency and energy crews are out in force on Wednesday working to clear debris off roads, and help residents clean-up from days of storms.
Disaster Recovery Minister Nikki Boyd said Energex had "1,000 sets of boots on the ground" working to restore power.
"As of this morning, 8,400 customers are without electricity due to the storms," she said.
"SES has had 5,370 jobs since Christmas Day."
More than 3,000 damage assessments across the south-east have deemed 10 premises totally destroyed, 145 moderately damaged and 386 homes with minor damage.
Deputy State Recovery Coordinator Ben Marcus said it was hoped homes in Mount Tamborine would be connected to a large generator by the end of the weekend.
"We're not talking one or two power poles, we're talking about hundreds and hundreds, so it will take quite a long time to do that," he said.
He said they were also working toward a deadline of January 22 to have as much debris cleared as possible.
"School is back in under two and a half weeks, so we need to have the roads open, the buses running, the schools open," Mr Marcus said.
"My major focus is those areas around Jimboomba, Cedar Vale, Cedar Grove, then back on the northern side, up into Wongawallan, they have some very large trees down.
"It's all hands on deck, and I think by the end of the weekend we'll see a significant increase in our reconstruction efforts."
QFES said it would have teams of chainsaw operators in and around the Gold Coast and Scenic Rim areas, working on clearing trees as best as possible.
Police Minister Mark Ryan said there were currently "usual" releases happening from Somerset Dam into Wivenhoe.
"Just to balance out the capacity of those dams, and to ensure the flood capacity is reserved for any potential, future events," he said.
Residents feel 'forgotten'
Meanwhile, thousands of residents and businesses are counting the huge financial and personal cost of this summer's disastrous weather events.
Gold Coast nurse Tammie Fogarty lost the roof off her Wongawallan home during the violent Christmas storm — at the time her 90-year-old father, who has Alzheimer's, was inside downstairs.
Both father and daughter survived the wild weather but just a week later, severe storms dumped more than 400mm of rain, washing away more of her property and drenching everything she owns.
"The water's going through all of my belongings, every room in my house is soaked," she said.
"It's just made it so much harder because the water's just collecting in the house, which is causing more damage and destruction."
She said a wall had collapsed on her bird cages, killing one of her beloved pet cockatiels and making way for two others to escape. One miraculously found nearly 20 kilometres away but the other is still missing.
"I found one bird in the rubble in the stairwell of the house," she explained.
"I recovered one other bird, who'd flown to Hope Island and someone was kind enough to save him and return him to us."
Ms Fogarty said her neighbourhood hadn't yet seen any council crews on their street, and the clean-up had been left to locals helping each other.
"It feels like we've been forgotten because we're not a well-known suburb," she said.
"We're all on large properties here, so we don't have a big population … and there hasn't been any response at all.
"We're really suffering up here and we're not getting any help."
Widespread damage
Maroochydore State Emergency Service (SES) volunteer Norm Vitelli was helping tarp a Sunshine Coast residence on Tuesday after the ceiling collapsed during the wild weather.
He said volunteers have been kept busy with roofing and sandbagging jobs across the region, as well as some calls for chainsaw assistance.
Loading...Despite the less-than-favourable conditions, he's continued to stay positive knowing how much the local community appreciates the help.
"We're just living the dream," Mr Vitelli laughed.
The team was stretched due to clean-up efforts further south, but Mr Vitelli said the favour would be returned if further north needed it.
"It's even tougher at the moment because we've got a lot of our [SES] people down on the Gold Coast as well … [but] we're coping with what we've got," he said.
About 50 Australian Defence Force (ADF) personnel are also expected to be deployed from Thursday to assist with clean-up in the Gold Coast, Scenic Rim and Logan City council areas.
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